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THE 



LAST YEARS OF LOUIS XV. 



The Publication Committee of The Club of Odd Volumes 
certify that this Copy is one of an Edition of One Hundred 
and Fifty Copies printed on Holland Hand-made Paper, and tins 
Copy is No. 

Cljairman. 



THE 



Last Years of Louis XV. 



2CtansIat£t) from tlje Jtcnrij 



OF 



IMBERT DE SAINT-AMAND 




BOSTON 

THE CLUB OF ODD VOLUMES 
1893 







d-o^±ji. J.^^. M <^^l^ {. ~ 



Copyright, 1893, 
By the Clue of Odd Volumes. 



John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 



He 133 
.■3 



CONTENTS. 



PART FIRST. 

PAGE 

Court and City at the Close of the Reign of Louis XV. ... i 

I. The King ' 8 

II. The Nobility 14 

III. The Clergy 17 

IV. The Magistracy 22 

V. The Bourgeoisie 30 

VI. The People 35 

VII. The Female Politicians 41 

VIII. Love , 46 

IX. The Famous Salons 53 

X. The Philosophes 71 

PART SECOND. 

The Women of the Court at Versailles at the Close of the Reign 
OF Louis XV. 1 768-1 774. 

L Louis XV. in 1768 81 

II. The Early History of the Comtesse du Barry .... 94 

III. The Comtesse du Barry's Triumph 102 

IV. Madame Louise de France, Inmate of the Carmelite 

Convent . . . m 



vi Contents. 

PAGE 

V. The Childhood of Marie-Antoinette . . . . . . . . 121 

VI. Marie-Antoinette's Arrival in France 131 

VII. The Marriage of Marie-Antoinette, and the Fetes at- 
tending IT 141 

VIII. The Dauphine and the Royal Family in 1770 150 

IX. Marie- Antoinette and Madame du Barry 159 

X. The Dauphine and Maria Theresa 172 

XL The Pavilion of Luciennes 188 

XII. Death of Louis XV 200 

EPILOGUE. — The Passing of Madame du Barry 211 



INDEX 227 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



MADAME DU BARRY : Frontispiece 

A fac-simile in Goupilgravure reproduced from a Portrait by De Creuse, 
after Drouais, in the Museum of Versailles. 

A GouPiL Photogravure in bistre of the same . . . To face page i 
MARIE ANTOINETTE 131 

A Goupil Photogravure in black reproduced from a Portrait by Mme. Vigee 
Lebrun, painted in 1783. 

A Goupil Photogravure in bistre of the same 141 



THE LAST YEARS OF LOUIS XV. 



PART FIRST. 

COURT AND CITY AT THE CLOSE OF THE REIGN 
OF LOUIS XV. 

TO live the life of those who are no more, to study an 
epoch thoroughly, to identify one's self with the per- 
sons, and familiarize one's self with their customs, their 
modes of thought, their passions, their tastes, their fashions, 
their prejudices, is in itself a sort of metempsychosis. 

In order to accomplish that purpose, one must detach 
himself from his own epoch, and, forgetting his own identity, 
imagine that he is somebody else. At first you pay but 
slight attention to the details of the memoirs of the time 
which you are studying, to the minutiae of all sorts which 
are only to be discerned, so to speak, with the aid of a 
magnifying-glass. But after a little, all the petty gossip and 
tittle-tattle of the day begin to fascinate you, and you seem 
to live again in a recreated past. It seems as if you were 
intimately acquainted with the original actors in the drama 
of which you are having a performance all by yourself. 
Vou fancy that you hear their voices, watch the play of 
their features, and you become for the nonce the courtier 



2 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

a la mode, the subscriber to the theatres, and the habiiui 
of the salons which you are trying to restore in all their 
former glory. 

It is something like that which I propose to myself to try 
and do for the last years of Louis XV., — those six years, from 
the death of the good Queen Marie Leczinska, to that of the 
monarch himself, who was no longer, except by antiphrasis, 
the " Well-Beloved." It is a period made interesting by the 
striking contrasts which it offers to the view, by the uncer- 
tain conflict between the old regime, which was just tottering 
in the last stages of debility, and the new order of things, 
which was still in an embryotic state. French society, with 
no regret for the past, and no fear for the future, was dancing 
and singing on towards the abyss. 

I try to imagine that instead of being an obscure man 
of letters of the nineteenth century, I am a courtier of the 
eighteenth ; that I am an eye-witness of the triumph of 
Madame du Barry; that I saw Madame Louise of France 
take the veil as a Carmelite nun ; and that I have been pres- 
ent at the bedside reception of that rising star who was 
called Marie-Antoinette. I doat upon Versailles, where the 
monarchy, even in its decadence, retains some little prestige ; 
but I much prefer Paris, — Paris, the fountain-head of public 
opinion, the city of luxury and intellect and pleasure. I live 
with the philosophes, though I distrust their doctrines, of 
which they do not appreciate the inevitable result. At 
Versailles a courtier of Louis XV., at Paris I am the inti 
mate friend of the kings and queens of fashion. I frequent 



Court and City. 3 

the salon of the Marquise du Deffand without getting my- 
self into hot water with Mademoiselle de Lespinasse. At 
Madame Geoffrin's I meet those great nobles, men of under- 
standing and taste, who, by mingling freely with authors and 
artists, establish a fusion between the aristocracy and men of 
letters, and those foreign diplomatists who do not conceal 
their infatuation with the advanced civilization of France, 
— of Paris above all. 

I am a welcome guest at those charming supper-parties 
where one forgets, for a moment, everything that is sad or 
gloomy in life, and thinks only of that which is soothing and 
pleasant. 

I dip into politics a bit at my leisure ; and when the Due 
de Choiseul falls from power, I pose as his warm adherent, 
and go to write my name with the rest upon the pillar at 
Chanteloup. The disputes between the magistracy and 
the clergy also possess interest for me ; but I do not take 
them so tragically as some. 

I see society divided into two hostile camps, — pessimists 
and optimists ; those who believe in the threatening danger, 
and those who laugh at it. But the last are vastly in the 
majority. The former declare that if the foundations of the 
altar are shaken, those upon which the throne is built may be 
no more solid. They regret the expulsion of the Jesuits ; 
they are loud in their condemnation of Voltaire. The fu- 
ture looks very black to them ; they are the true prophets 
of evil. The others smile when one gives sign of fear. 
When they have uttered the words " toleration," " equality," 



4 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

" liberty," they think they have said all there is to be said. 
They scoff at the Cassandras foretelling public disaster, at 
the priests who wring their hands over the prevailing in- 
credulity, at Louis XV. gazing uneasily at the portrait of 
Charles I. of England. How absurd the thought that a loyal, 
chivalrous nation, such a nation as the French, could ever 
send its anointed king to the scaffold ! Is not society 
becoming every day more moderate in tone, more enlightened 
and more tolerant } Are not the old religious disputes 
falling into desuetude ? Is not the nobility taking the lead 
in a free and liberal movement ? Have not the priests 
become socially as eligible as worldly people .f' Is not edu- 
cation making marvellous progress every day. 

When had literature greater prestige 1 Was there ever 
a time when liberal ideas, desire for useful reforms, and 
plans looking to the extension of civilization were more 
fashionable.'' Is not science, which brings to light new 
marvels every day, joining hands with the new philosophy 
to benefit, to pacify, and to regenerate the human race .? 

And it is such an epoch as this that you would charac- 
terize as a time given over to confusion, to anarchy, and 
to bloody revolution ! 

" Back, ye waverers ! " cry the philosophes. " Back, ye 
men of former days, who would enchain and degrade man- 
kind ! Nothing, no, nothing, will impede the irresistible 
movement which is drawing France, and all Europe in her 
wake, on in the path of progress towards indefinable, 
boundless perfection. Lay aside these cowardly arguments, 



Court and City. 5 

these imaginary alarms, tliis terror fit only for children, or 
old men in their dotage. All the spectres which you 
evoke will not terrify us. Your phantasmagoria only makes 
us laugh. In vain do you raise your voice to frighten us 
with your tragic threats and your gloomy predictions. Back, 
back, ye waverers ! The world is moving on, and you can- 
not stop it ! " 

I listen to this torrent of fine words, but I confess that 
they are not altogether convincing to me ; I have not such 
a firm belief as that in the approach of the Golden Age. 
"After me, the deluge," cried Louis XV., they say, in 
Madame Du Barry's boudoir. Louis XV. sees no good 
augury for the future, and it may be that he is right. 

And I, who am whirled about in the vortex of society; 
I, who am in the thick of that excited, feverish, brilliant life, 
the life of the court and the city, of salons and boudoirs, of 
academies and theatres ; I, who am of all the supper-parties, 
all the fetes, and an indefatigable first-nighter; I, the friend 
of all the great lords and famous men, of all the fashionable 
beauties, — I too have, in common with the old king, my 
moments of depression and discouragement. Sometimes 
all these men and women whom I meet in society seem 
to me, as to the old Marquise du Deffand, " like mere 
machines, who go and come, chatter and laugh, without 
thought or reflection or emotion, playing each his part 
mechanically and from long habit." Mere worldly creatures, 
outwardl}^ earnest and enthusiastic, but realty indifferent 
to everything; spiteful allusions, upon which jealousy and 



6 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

idleness feed and thrive ; insipid love-making, which is a mere 
burlesque of passion ; everlasting disquisitions upon love 
and friendship pronounced by those who never have 
known, and never will know, more than the theory of those 
sentiments ; selfish, lukewarm alliances, growing out of the 
artificial life of the salons, — yes, there are times when 
you weary me beyond measure, and the mere thought of 
you is horrible to me. There are moments when I say 
to myself, " Where will this rage for philosophy end ? 
What sort of a structure will rise over all this ruin ? 
What will become of the throne without the altar, of the 
nobility without the clergy? What will come of this 
Tower of Babel called the Encyclopedie? ' " 

And, after all, what a world of sadness really lies hidden 
beneath this mask of gayety! What emptiness and wretched- 
ness ! How bitter is the flavor at the bottom of these cups 
of crystal ! How many thorns among the roses, and how 
many bitter cares beneath these powdered wigs ! Ye brilliant 
beauties, what lines of anguish are drawn on your rouge- 
laden cheeks ! 

O eighteenth century, which vaunted so proudly thy 
intellect, thy boldness, and thy alleged progress; century 
of philosophers, of learned great ladies, of noblemen turned 
artists, of omnipotent wielders of the pen ; century of 
Rousseau and Voltaire, of Diderot and Helvetius, — thou 
eighteenth century, now drawing to a close, what will thy 
last years be ? 

But a truce to gloomy forebodings. I cry, with Horace 



Court and City. 7 

Walpole, " I laugh so, that I need not weep. I play with 
monkeys and dogs and cats, to avoid being devoured by the 
beast of Gevaudan." Let us then, since there is still time, 
taste the sweets of life and emotion. Let us scrutinize with- 
out prejudice this society which has so much that is charm- 
ing and alluring, with all its faults and vices. Court and 
city, nobility, clergy, magistracy, bourgeoisie, common people, 
philosophes, men of letters, women, — yes, the women above 
all ; let us pass them in review one after another, the 
actors and supernumeraries of a comedy which will end, soon 
it may be, with the most pathetic and sombre of imaginable 
scenes. The new world comes on apace ; let us cast a last 
glance upon the old. 



THE KING. 

TOWARDS the close of the reign of Louis XV. the 
court was out of fashion. To be sure, the old etiquette 
was in force there, and one found the same old names and 
the same distinctions of caste. But the king was old, and, 
more than that, the king was ridiculous. His passion for a 
mere courtesan, for a Du Barr}', had in it something absurd 
and pitiably grotesque. Versailles no longer trembled before 
him, but laughed at him. They made sport of the amorous 
monarch who was playing an out-of-date pastoral comedy 
with a harlot. The " Well-beloved of the Almance," as he 
was satirically called, was no longer taken seriously. 

In 1 77 1 some joker circulated this version of the Lord's 
Prayer, dedicated to His Most Christian Majesty: "Our 
Father who art at Versailles, hallowed be thy name: thy 
reign is played out, and thy will is no more done in earth 
than in heaven. Give back to us our daily bread, which 
thou hast taken away ; forgive thy Parliaments who have 
upheld thy interests, as thou hast forgiven thy ministers who 
have betrayed them. Yield no more to the temptations of 
the Du Barry, but deliver us from thy devil of a chancellor." 
Affairs at Versailles, however, are still conducted as deco- 



The Kins. 



'A' 



rously as of yore. The gentlemen on duty fulfil the func- 
tions of their respective offices with the same assiduity. The 
king's levee is still a farce in five acts, in which the courtiers 
appear as supernumeraries of high degree. There are still 
the entrees familieres, when the king is awake, but still in 
bed ; the grandes entrees^ when he has risen and donned his 
dressing-gown ; then the so-called entrees de la chambre, 
when he is seated in his arm-chair at the toilette-table; and, 
lastly, the general entree, which admits the common herd 
of courtiers, who have been waiting since dawn in the 
Galerie des Glaces. 

Versailles is still, as of old, a city of eighty thousand 
souls, filled and dominated by the life of a single man, — an 
essentially royal city, marvellously well adapted to supply the 
service, the pleasures, the body-guard, and the society of the 
sovereign. The immortal race of courtiers is unceasingly 
recruited from the clever and compliant men who, upon 
making their debut at court, have received this advice, and 
followed it to the letter : " You have but three things to 
do, — speak well of everybody, apply for every vacant post, 
and sit down whenever you can." 

But all these courtiers, in spite of their irreproachable 
demeanor, resemble priests who have ceased to believe in 
their god. Quantities of incense are still burned at the idol's 
feet, through force of habit ; but the idol hardly deceives 
anybody now. Etiquette, which is still enforced in all its 
tedious regulations, is a custom simply ; it is no longer a 
cult. Prestige has disappeared. No successor to Dangeau 



lo The Last Years of Louis XV. 

or to De Luynes is to be found ; moreover, money, the vital 
principle of courts, is becoming less plentiful. Horace Wal- 
pole writes, on the 30th July, 1771: "There is incredible 
distress here, especially at court ; the king's tradesmen are 
ruined ; his servants are dying of hunger ; the angels and 
archangels themselves would fail to receive their pensions or 
salaries. So they are singing, ' Woe ! Woe ! Woe ! ' instead 
of ' Hosannah ! ' Compiegne is abandoned. Villers-Cotterets 
and Chantilly are crowded. Chanteloup is even more in 
vogue.* Every one goes there who chooses, although, when 
the king's permission is asked, the invariable reply is, ' I 
say neither yes nor no.' It is the first time that the will of 
a king of France has ever been interpreted against his 
meaning. After abolishing the Parliament and destroy- 
ing the public credit, he meekly submits to the slights of 
his personal attendants. Madame de Beauvau and two or 
three other ladies of an enterprising character defy this Tsar 
of the Gauls." 

Walpole takes care to add that the insubordination of 
these ladies is really of no serious importance. " It must 
be said that they and their intrigues have about as little 
cohesive power as their party. They make epigrammes, sing 
vaudevilles aimed at the favorite, and distribute pamphlets 
against the Chancellor Maupeou ; but all this has no more 
result than a shot fired in the air." 

* Villers-Cotterets and Chantilly were the seats of the Due d'OrMans and 
Prince de Condd, who were then in disgrace for taking sides with the former Par- 
liament of Paris against the Chancellor Maupeou. Chanteloup was the place of 
exile of the Due de Choiseul. 



The King. ii 

To sum up, people retain for the king, if not affection 
and respect, — they have long since ceased to exist, — a cer- 
tain indulgent feeling. They make excuses for the old 
fellow as they might do for a spoiled child. He has done 
wrong, perhaps ; but then he has done some good too. He 
has lost the colonies ; but he has annexed Lorraine and 
Corsica to France. He has held his own against powerful 
coalitions. He is the victor of Fontenoy. His old arm has 
been strong enough to smite the Parliament; and that cotip 
d'etat postponed the final catastrophe for some years. 

Louis XV., pious and debauched, discontented with 
others as with himself, a curious compound of indecision 
and energy, of heedlessness and common-sense ; Louis 
XV., retaining still something of dignity and quiet good- 
breeding, of the demeanor befitting a gentleman and a 
sovereign ; Louis XV., to be pitied rather than blamed, it 
may be, — is the type of the old regime, the incarnation of 
the monarchy, which, notwithstanding its visible decay, has 
clung to some fragments of attractiveness and of strength 
and authority. 

He is a confirmed debauchee, no doubt ; but, after all, he 
is no better or worse than so many gray-haired Celadons, 
so many veterans of Cythera and superannuated rakes, who 
would think their vital spark was extinct if they ceased to 
have mistresses. Even learned magistrates play such pranks 
sometimes. They have their little houses, their boudoirs, 
their temples of pleasure. The eighteenth century, epicu- 
rean at heart, is only half indignant with the royal gallantry. 



12 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

It laughs at it, and the monarchical principle is assailed 
much less by direct attack than by a weapon more formi- 
dable, perhaps, — ridicule. When I see Louis XV. at mass 
in the chapel at Versailles, praying very earnestly in the 
royal gallery, not far from his unworthy favorite, — who is 
without paint or powder, and has not even made her toilet, — 
I have difficulty in repressing a contemptuous exclamation. 

As for the old king, proud as a peacock of his victory 
over Parliament, he thinks that he has, by a master-stroke, 
assured himself a long and peaceable old age. In his own 
mind he gives himself several more years of dissipation. 
Then, he tells himself, the time for repentance will come ; 
then he will repent and be truly devout, and will be the 
most Christian king, otherwise than in name. How many 
old rakes there are who thus postpone the hour of their final 
conversion, while boasting of an inborn, if somewhat hypo- 
critical, respect for religion ! This half piety, this rough 
draught of virtue, this penitence dependent upon a future 
contingency, we find in many souls. Is there aught more 
feeble or inconsequent than the nature of man } We rub 
elbows with such as Louis XV. every hour of our lives. 
Men with his proclivities almost all resemble the lover of 
the Du Barry, when they grow old ; and examples are very 
rare of such men who, while their health is intact and money 
plentiful, will consent to become hermits, notwithstanding 
their gray hairs. 

The prevailing sentiment with regard to the king is not 
so much hatred as indifference. He will be allowed to die 



The King. 13 

in peace, and his subjects will be content to look on, with no 
emotion of any sort, at the setting of this winter sun which 
gives neither heat nor light. Some there are who sigh 
impatiently for a new reign to begin. Wise heads consider 
the future Louis XVI. too young. After all, Louis XV., 
despite his mistakes, his defects, and his vicious habits, is a 
man of experience, and skilled in the science of government. 
But when will the Dauphin possess the necessary knowledge.'' 
How much time will be required to teach him the most 
elementary principles of that difficult art, the art of reign- 
ing.? He will have the best intentions; he will be honorable, 
upright, and virtuous. But all that is not enough. The task 
will be a heavy one for young shoulders. For this reason, 
Maria Theresa, woman of genius that she is, and endowed 
with keen and accurate vision, fears nothing so much as 
the death of Louis XV., the much-decried monarch. As 
king, if not as man, the oldster was worth much more than 
the child. 



II. 

THE NOBILITY. 

THERE are two parties in the nobility, — conservatives 
and liberals ; men of the past, and men of the future. 
The former are firm in support of the alliance between 
throne and altar, and insist upon respectful observance of 
all the old customs, and the rigid maintenance of the formal- 
ities of etiquette. Irreconcilable foes of the new philos- 
ophy, of Anglomania, and the " Encyclopedic," they look 
with a scornful and angry eye upon the changes in dress, 
the disuse of liveries, and the rage for foreign fashions. The 
liberals, combining with the advantages of patrician birth 
the charm of a life of independence, joyfully adopt the 
cabriolets, the dress-coats, and the simple English fashions. 
They applaud the republican declamations at the theatres, 
the levellins: discourses of the academies, the anti-Christian 
theories of the philosophes. They treat the old social edifice 
as architecture of the Gothic style. Their own social privi- 
leges, the remnants of their own former prestige, are being 
dug from beneath their feet; but what matters it.? This 
" little war," as the Comte de Segur says, both pleases and 
entertains them. They do not yet feel the danger, they see 
only the spectacle. Slaves of the prevailing fashion, they 



The Nobility. 15 

rush to pay their court to D'Alembert, Diderot, Marmontel, 
or Raynal, — a word of praise from whose mouth they 
esteem more highly than the favor of a prince of the blood. 

Equality begins to make its appearance in the world. 
On many occasions literary eminence takes precedence of 
titles of nobility. One often sees, in the first society, men 
of letters of the second or third rate treated with more 
deference and consideration than is bestowed upon the pro- 
vincial nobility. But do not be misled ; all this democratic, 
almost republican, show is as yet only an optical illusion. 
The old customs — so says the same liberal authority, 
the Comte de Segur — still maintain between nobles and 
bourgeoisie a tremendous gulf, which mere talents, even 
the most distinguished, only seem to cross. There is more 
familiarity than equality. Great trees, which lose their roots 
whether they will or no, are none the less proud of their 
foliage. So splendid ancestry, magnificent establishments, 
feudal ways of life, attributes of former power, — all these 
seem fated to live forever. The castes of the old social 
regime, with their proud hierarchy, their splendid display, 
their heraldic blazonry, their opulence and their power, are 
like " those gorgeous pictures of a thousand hues, drawn 
with sand upon glass, where one can see and admire superb 
castles, smiling landscapes, and bounteous harvests, which 
it needs but the lightest breath to blow away." 

Do not think, however, that the nobility has lost all its 
former prestige, despite its decadence. No, it still retains 
its loyalty, its refinement, and its courteous manners and 



1 6 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

breeding The least of the provincial squires preserve its 
traditions. They have frequented the salon of the com- 
mandant, or intendant, and have met some ladies from 
Versailles, visiting in the provinces. Thus are they, almost 
all, acquainted with the changing fashions and customs. 

" The most unpolished will go down to the lowest step 
of his porch, hat in hand, to escort his guests to their 
carriage, thanking them for the honor they have done him. 
The most boorish, when with a lady, will hunt up in his 
memory some fragments of the gallantry of the days of 
chivalry. The poorest and most secluded will furbish up 
his coat of king's blue, and his cross of Saint Louis, that 
he may be able, on occasion, to pay his respects to his 
neighbor, the great lord of the neighborhood, or to the 
prince on his travels." * 

The nobility of the court, frivolous, dissipated, and Voltai- 
rian, must not make us lose sight of the provincial nobility, 
who live in austere tranquillity, respecting the principles, 
customs, and tenets of their class, bearing honorable poverty 
without a murmur rather than beg favors at Versailles, and 
making ready, in their retirement, to meet with noble resolu- 
tion the tempests of which they can already foresee the 
approach. 

* M. Taine, " Les Origines de la France contemporaine." One volume. 
Hachette. 



III. 

THE CLERGY. 

JUST as we find in the ranks of the aristocracy, by the 
side of the nobly born courtiers who too often lead 
corrupt and useless lives, a provincial nobility faithful to 
their honorable traditions and to morality and virtue, so 
there are to be found beside the worldly, corrupt prelates, 
priests who lead honorable and respectable lives of sincere 
piety, and who set an edifying example to their countrymen. 

In the body of the clergy, as in the nobility, I distinguish 
between the rich and the poor, the scoffers and the true 
believers, the men whose whole lives are a scandal, and 
those who strive to do what is right. Doubtless there are 
many reforms to be desired, many abuses to be put down. 
The princes of the Church, vested with feudal prerogatives, 
the heirs or successors of the former sovereign princes of 
the country ; the hundred and thirty-one bishops and arch- 
bishops, the seven hundred abbes commendataires, with their 
fashionable manners, their great wealth, and their luxurious 
establishments, — are not all models of moralit)^. I might 
name more than one prelate who not only has his mistresses, 
his hangers-on, his select boon-companions, his morning 
reception, his crowded ante-chamber, and his ushers and 



1 8 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

household officers, but who is also deeply in debt ; thereby 
putting the finishing touch to the parallel between himself 
and the great nobles. 

The Marquis de Mirabeau writes in 1766: "It would be 
looked upon as insulting by the majority of the ecclesiastics 
with pretensions, simply to suggest to them to take charge 
of a parish. The salaries and preferments are for the abbes 
commendataires, for the incumbents who have received the 
tonsure without taking orders, or for the numerous chapters." 
There are churchmen who have an income of half a million. 
One hears mention of the hunting-stable of this bishop, of 
the satin-trimmed confessionals of another, and of the superb 
solid silver kitchen outfit of a third. I meet at every turn 
in the salons or boudoirs of the ladies of fashion these min- 
cing court abbes who have nothing of the priest save the 
dress, and who do not always wear that, — these anacreontic 
abbes, compliant friends of the grandes dames, worshippers 
at the footstool of the pkilosopkes, purveyors of scandal, and 
scribblers of frivolous verses. But they are not the clergy 
properly so-called. The real clergy are to be found in the 
unpretending vicarages of the cities and villages, — above 
all, in the latter. Yes, although I know the prelate who 
plays the great lord, who leads a life of luxurious idleness, 
frequenter of salons and the court, and who mounts the 
steps of the marble stairway at Versailles with much more 
alacrity than he shows in mounting the steps of the altar, 
I know also the humble, poor, all-enduring priest, the pattern 
of devotion, of self-sacrifice, and faithfulness to duty, — the 



The Clergy. 19 

veritable man of God. Although I meet the bishop exult- 
ing in his golden cross, so do I reverently salute the 
country curate who walks leagues upon leagues in the mud 
or the snow, staff in hand. There are, without doubt, some 
female convents which are so tainted with worldliness that 
they seem like centres of the fashionable aristocracy; but 
there are, on the other hand, real convents, the abode of true 
piety and saintly devotion. 

One of the daughters of Louis XV., Madame Louise 
de France, becomes a Carmelite ; and the daughters of 
the order of Mount Carmel make no terms with half- 
hearted piety. There do exist, I know, certain preachers 
who are more engrossed in the " Encyclopedic " than in 
the holy Gospels, and who more nearly resemble Acade- 
micians than priests. There are some, too, — so I am told, 
— who forget to make the sign of the cross when they 
ascend the pulpit, who entirely omit all forms of prayer, 
and make their sermon a sort of conference with their 
hearers. Bachaumont tells us that that is called preaching 
a la grecque. But there are, on the other hand, energetic, 
impassioned preachers, on whose eloquent lips the sacred 
terrors of the doctrine of the Church lose none of their 
force ; men of faith and courage, who, like the apostles, 
cry out, in view of the scandalous tendencies of the age: 
" Non possumus non loqui" — " We cannot keep silence." 
In a sermon remarkable for its saintlike courage, the 
Bishop of Alais divides society into two classes, — one 
which has everything, the other nothing, — and demands to 



20 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

know what justification there can be for the possession of 
inimitable privilege by those whose virtue is infinitesimal. 

One day, the Abbe de Beauvais, preaching in the chapel 
of the palace at Versailles, spoke in terms of severe 
censure, before the king himself, of the shameful life of 
the gray-bearded libertines. At the close of the sermon 
Louis XV. said to that old sot, the Marechal de Richelieu: 
" Well, Marechal, I should say the preacher has been 
throwing stones into your garden." 

" Yes, Sire," rejoined the malicious courtier, " and one 
or two of his missiles rebounded into the park of 
Versailles." 

The evangelical traditions are maintained, in spite of 
everything. Even in the most heedless, the most corrupt 
and vicious epochs, there are always — and if not on the 
surface, in the depths of society — hidden treasures, inex- 
haustible springs of love and virtue. No, no, Messietirs 
les Philosophes, do not confound the Church, the Holy 
Church, with a few simoniacal priests, a few contraband 
abbes, who are its bane. 

Do but count up all those who are still to be found in 
the city and country, in every market-town, in every hamlet, 
of faithful servants of Christ, bringing succor to the needy, 
and comfort to the afilicted. There are, to be sure, grave 
scandals and crying abuses, at which Christian souls 
deeply grieve. And yet you will see, when the supreme 
crisis arrives, how many priests will have the strength and 
courage to meet death like the early Christian martyrs. 



The Clergy. 2i 

You, who believe that the clergy are done with forever, 
will soon be lost in wonder, perhaps, to see how many 
heroic and fearless men it can boast. During the storm 
which is at hand you will realize what this ridiculed, 
decried religion is, how great its worth and its power. 
You think now that the Church is in a state of decay. 
But persecution will bring back its youth, if necessary. 
It will be rebaptized ; and its second baptism, which will 
wash out every stain, will be a baptism of blood. 



IV. 

THE MAGISTRACY. 

n^HE same contrasts which I find in the nobility and 
the clergy are repeated in the magistracy. Beside 
magistrates of the old-fashioned temper, sober-minded and 
severe, devoted to tradition, obeying the dictates of duty, 
and conscious of the dignity of their profession, I am 
grieved to observe epicurean brethren, disciples of 
Voltaire, intriguing devotees of pleasure, superficial and 
frivolous, partisans of revolutionary ideas, and preparing 
the way, unknown to themselves, for the overturning of 
throne and altar alike, with no sus^sicion of the serious 
nature of the blows they are dealing at the foundations of 
society. They are only in appearance the defenders of law 
and order; in reality they are nothing better than active 
agents of their subversion. They do not even take the 
pains to be hypocritical about it. The same men who 
send Calas to the wheel, and La Barre to the scaffold, 
keep a copy of Voltaire's " Pucelle " upon their drawing- 
room tables, and are the intimate friends and flatterers 
of the materialists, the atheists. If a book is ordered to 
be burned, the sentence brings a smile to the lips of 
the magistrate who utters it. 



The Magistracy. 23 

" They inveigh against the decrees," says Bachaumont ; 
" a bright saying is a sufficient answer to a sermon ; and 
if Parliament intervenes, they congratulate themselves on 
the honor of having the book burned." 

It is no longer looked upon as a punishment, but as 
an advertisement. Do not imagine, either, that monsieur 
the executioner of noble works of the pen is allowed to 
cast into the fire those books whose titles appear in the 
decree of the court. " Messieurs the magistrates would 
be very sorry to deprive their libraries of a copy of each 
of those works, which will come to them in due course ; 
so the clerk supplies their place with some wretched, 
paltry volumes which no one will ever miss." * 

These parliamentarians, who occupy a position midway 
between the greatest nobles and the bourgeoisie; who are 
wealthy, influential, allied to the most powerful families in 
France ; these great lords of the robe, each one of whom 
has his own little Versailles, — a fine mansion, with court- 
yard and garden, — and who are to the main body of the 
magistracy what the prelates are to the clergy, — these 
leading spirits of the Parliament gradually become formi- 
dable foes of the Monarchy. 

Louis XV. holds them in holy horror. From the time 
of Madame de Pompadour he has looked upon them as 
enemies, and the most to be dreaded of all. 

" These great gentlemen of the robe," he said one day 
to the favorite, " are always at daggers drawn with the 
* Grimm, Correspondance Litt^raire, 1773. 



24 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

clergy; they drive me to distraction with their quarrelling; 
but I despise the gentlemen of the robe much the more. 
My clergy are in their hearts devoted and faithful to me, 
vifhile the others would like to keep me under guardianship. 
The Regent was very ill-advised to restore their right of 
remonstrating ; they will end by destroying the State." 

" Ah, Sire," rejoined M. de Gontant, " the State is much 
too powerful to be demoralized by such little wretches as 
they." 

" You have no idea of their capacity for ill," replied 
the king; "it is an assemblage of republicans. But never 
mind ; things will endure in their present state as long 
as I live." 

Confusion is already rife in the governing class. Mon- 
tesquieu wrote : " There are in France three estates, — the 
Church, the sword, and the robe. Each of the three has 
a sovereign contempt for the other two." 

One of Louis' ministers for Foreign Affairs, the Marquis 
d 'Argenson, has predicted the inevitable outcome of this 
regime of dissension, of unceasing conflict of power. 

" What will be the reply in the future," he wrote, " to 
the question whether despotism shall flourish or be put 
down in France } For my own part, I am for the second 
course, — I even hope for the advent of republicanism. 
Louis XV. has not succeeded in governing tyrannically, 
or as the head of a republic ; and in this land, when one 
does not assume either the one or the other of those char- 
acters, woe to royal prestige ! The people have become 



The Magistracy. 25 

excellent critics of the parliaments, and see in them only 
the cure for the annoyance which they suffer from another 
direction. All this portends a revolution smouldering 
under the ashes." 

It was in 1752 that the same Marquis d 'Argenson 
penned the following prophetic lines : " The wretched 
fruits of our absolute monarchy are sure to demonstrate 
to France and to all Europe that it is the very worst of 
all possible forms of government. I do not mean to say, 
with the philosophes, that even anarchy would be better. 
However, that opinion is making rapid headway, and may 
end by producing a national revolution." 

An earnest and militant opposition has been directed 
against the Church in the very bosom of Catholicism, and 
against the royal power among the nobility of the robe 
and the parliamentary bourgeoisie. A species of league 
has been formed by all the Parliaments in France, which 
look upon themselves as constituent parts of a single 
assembly, as the joint and several members of an indivisible 
body. Louis XV., surprisingly energetic at times, awakes 
from his torpor, and realizes the need of striking a vigorous 
blow. During the night of the 19th of January, 1771, 
all those members of the Parliament of Paris who, in a 
spirit of opposition, have refused to fulfil their functions, 
are arrested in their houses, and required to reply "Yes" 
or " No " to a royal command to resume their customary 
duties. They reply, " No," and are exiled. 

The people remain impassive, and the dissolved Parlia- 



26 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

ment makes way, without resistance, for the new one, — 
called, from the name of the chancellor, the Parliament 
Maupeou. Louis XV. believes himself to be more power- 
ful than Louis XIV., and the chancellor mightier than 
Richelieu. Madame de Pompadour overthrew the Jesuits; 
Madame Du Barry overthrows the parliamentary party, 
— that is to say, the Jansenists. The two rival factions, 
Jesuit and Jansenist, having disappeared, would one not 
believe that absolute monarchy remains standing alone and 
unshaken upon their ruins ? 

But it is only an optical delusion. The Parliament 
Maupeou is discredited from the start, and is sustained 
with but little vigor by the power which created it. It 
allows the affair of Beaumarchais against the Counsellor 
Goezman — an affair of most trifling importance in itself, 
but momentous in its consequences — to assume incredible 
proportions. The Polish question, dramatic and terrible, 
engrosses the attention of Versailles and Paris less than 
this wretched quarrel between the author of the "Barbier 
de Seville " and one of his judges, or, to speak more accu- 
rately, the wife of one of his judges. 

What was the point at issue } Whether or not the 
wife of a Counsellor of the Parliament retained the sum 
of fifteen louis received from a litigant. Whence, pray, 
so much public interest and passion } Why this feverish 
anxiety, this insane curiosity, with which all Paris, — indeed, 
all France, — follows the trivialities of this lawsuit.? Be- 
cause it is a symbolical episode. The subject of inves- 



The Magistracy. 27 

tigation is not so much the domestic economy of the 
Goezman household as the Parliament Maupeou as a 
whole. Upon the culprit's stool I seem to see, not Beau- 
marchais, but the magistracy. He it is, he, the defendant, 
who, by an interchange of characters, appears as the king's 
prosecutor — what do I say ? — as the prosecutor, rather, 
of the new-born power, public opinion. His statements 
become the public prosecutor's address to the court. The 
cause is a political quite as much as a judicial one. All 
parts of the old social structure are honeycombed and 
mined. All the springs of the old machine are getting out 
of order one by one. And instead of weeping, the privi- 
leged classes do nothing but laugh. The Goezman lawsuit 
is a comedy, in which the proscenium boxes find as much 
amusement as the pit. 

I am not sure that Louis XV. himself — even Louis 
XV., so hard as he is to amuse — does not unbend some- 
what over it ; certainly Madame Du Barry gets a vast 
amount of sport out of it. She has proverbs acted in her 
apartments, in which Madame Goezman and Beaumarchais 
are brought face to face. Beaumarchais is the cynosure of 
every eye, he has become the fashionable lion, the hero 
of the hour. 

" 1 am afraid," writes Voltaire, " that this brilliant hot- 
head is right against all the world. His na'iveie enchants 
me (the naivete of Beaumarchais!). I forgive him his 
imprudence and petulance." 

The conclusion of the most serious of all affairs, a most 



28 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

momentous treaty of peace, would be awaited less im- 
patiently than is the result of this lawsuit, which fills 
the thoughts, incredible as it may seem, of many nations 
and many kings, to so great a degree does France, even in 
her decline, preserve the faculty, in these closing years of 
Louis XV., of attracting the attention of all Europe to 
anything which takes place within her borders! "Judg- 
ment at last ! " as Chicaneau says in Racine's " Plaideurs. " 
On the 26th of February, 1774, after seven months of 
expectation, the decree is pronounced. Madame Goezman 
is condemned to be reprimanded, and to make restitution of 
the fifteen louis, to be distributed among the poor. And 
Beaumarchais, too, is condemned to be reprimanded. 

To be reprimanded! It is no trifling punishment, but 
an infamous one, and renders him who undergoes it, 
ineligible for public employment. The culprit receives the 
sentence on his knees before the court, the president 
addressing him thus : " The court reprimands you, and 
declares you infamous." Oh, well! The man whom the 
Parliament Maupeou fancied that it could thus brand with 
infamy, is throned in triumph, and all Paris hastens to write 
its name upon the convict's visitor's book. The Prince de 
Conti and the Due de Chartres give a great banquet for 
him, the day after the sentence; M. de Sartine says to 
him : " It is not enough to be reprimanded, you must be 
modest too." 

The opposition, nodding for an instant, awakes with 
energy renewed. Pamphlets and diatribes begin again 



The Magistracy. 29 

to rain down upon the Parliament Maupeou, which, by 
the very act of inflicting civil death upon a man whom 
public opinion idolized, has dealt itself a mortal blow. Its 
days, like those of the old king, are numbered. As for 
Louis XV., basing his opinion of Beaumarchais upon the 
address which the clever fellow has shown in the Goez- 
man matter, he intrusts him with a secret mission to 
England. 

When such discordant notes are heard in society, the 
catastrophe is not far away. 



V. 

THE BOURGEOISIE. 

\ N extraordinary fact is that the Revolution has its origin 
in the higher ranks of society ; that it works down, not 
up. The suffering classes, the hungry classes, are submissive 
and silent. The privileged classes, on the other hand, — 
those who, amid the public distress, are gorged with gold 
and debauchery, are the ones who whine and complain. The 
higher you mount in the social scale, the less virtue and 
true faith do you find. The common people are better than 
the bourgeoisie, the botirgeoisie better than the nobility ; the 
provincial nobles are more estimable than those of the 
court, the lower orders of the priesthood than the prelates. 
One would say that morality, being in inverse ratio to 
rank, the most formidable foes of society are the very ones 
who have the most to lose if it goes under. The great 
landed proprietors are demolishing their own mansions and 
chateaux. The prelates are sapping the underpinning of the 
Church. The princes of the blood are shaking the throne. 
It is in this way that the self-styled defenders of the social 
fortress are spiking their guns, levelling their breastworks, 
dampening their powder, shattering their v/eapons, and will 
eventually end by delivering the key of the citadel to the 
enemy. 



The Bourgeoisie. 31 

The great mass of the bourgeoisie still holds out against 
the invading forces of impiety. At Paris, as well as in the 
provinces, the prevailing idea among good citizens of the 
middle class is still : " Without the Monarchy, and with- 
out the Church — anarchy." In religion and in politics, 
even though they are in the opposition, their demands go 
no farther than the liberties of the Galilean Church, and the 
constitutional guarantees thereof demanded by the Parlia- 
ments. Even though they have ceased to love and respect 
Louis XV., they continue to respect in his person the 
royal idea. 

Estimable men, of calm and reflective temperament, they 
have as little desire to make war upon the nobility as to 
truckle to them. As for the Monarchy, they look upon it as 
a dogma, an indispensable portion of their faith. 

The bourgeois Regnaud thus expresses himself: "It is 
a law of the realm, sanctioned throughout the ages by the 
divine command, to respect the sovereign, even when he 
brings misfortune upon the people whom Providence has 
intrusted to his care. God forbid that in this narrative 
which I am writing I should undertake to disregard that 
sacred law." * 

Another bourgeois. Prosper Hardy, delivers himself as 
follows in his Memoirs : " Although I have never regarded 
myself as anything more than a mere molecule of society, I 
think that I deserve to occupy an honorable position there by 

* MS. Mimoires of Regnaud, Procureur of the Parliament of Paris under tiie 
coup d'etat oi 1771. 



32 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

virtue of my unswerving fidelity to my sovereign, and my love 
for his sacred person. The sentiments which I have imbibed 
in the course of my education, and in the books which I 
have read, will never be rooted out of my heart. Although, 
by God's will, my fortune is of the slightest, the promise of 
an income of one hundred thousand crowns would not tempt 
me to give up a possession which is of inestimable value to 
me, and which cannot be stolen from me, — to wit, the 
sense of my unblemished honor and my genuine patriot- 
ism. I should always consider it my bounden duty to" 
have no other opinions in the present controversies than 
those held by the first magistrates of the realm and the 
princes of the blood royal, who have demonstrated their 
sentiments in no uncertain tone, and with all due respect 
for our august master, by their solemn protest, to which all 
20od citizens cannot fail to render a tribute of admiration, 
and to subscribe with all their souls."* 

The opposition still hedges itself about with most defe- 
rential respect for the person and the authority of the 
sovereign. Hardy casts the odium for the ill that is done 
upon the ministers, and makes no charge against Louis XV. 
He complains of despotism, but never of the king. 

Just as one finds in the heart of the provinces old- 
fashioned manor-houses, castle-keeps blackened by the hand 
of time, where abide virtuous and estimable gentlemen of 
the old school, proud of their pedigree and their poverty, so 
one finds, even in worldly and frivolous Paris, time-worn 

* MS. Mimoires of Simeon Prosper Hardy. 



The Bourgeoisie. 33 

mansions which shelter honorable folk who lead a tranquil, 
patriarchal existence, — peaceable bourgeois, good citizens of 
their quarter, regular in their attendance upon parish meet- 
ings, and members of their guild. 

Their life slips away, a succession of days exactly alike, 
"following, like a captive stream, the course marked out for 
it in advance, without ever losing sight of the steeple under 
whose shadow they were born, of the church where lie the 
sacred remains of their forbears, and where the same tomb 
stands open for the generation still to come. In the brief 
period between the beginning and the end, the prescribed 
forms of professional duty take possession of the man, fur- 
nish occupation for his mind, and fill the measure of his 
intellect." * 

Religious feeling is still uppermost, even at Paris, among 
the bourgeoisie and the common people. In February, 1 766, 
Louis XV. crossed the Pont-Neuf, at the conclusion of a 
Bed of Justice which he had held in the palace of the 
Parliament. A priest bearing the viaticum met the royal 
procession. The king descended from his carriage, and 
knelt in the road. This act of devotion aroused tremen- 
dous enthusiasm in the crowd of bystanders, and cries 
of " Vive le Roi ! " were heard on all sides with more 
unanimity and heartfelt vigor than ever before. 

The botirgeoisie is still Christian and royalist. But let us 
not deceive ourselves, it threatens to become revolutionary. 
Certain characteristic symptoms are beginning to appear. 

* M. Charles Aubertin, V Esprit public dit Dix-huitihiie Sihle. 

3 



34 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

The clerks of the basoche * sometimes wear the aspect of 
demagogues, and a sort of democratic hiss is coming to be 
frequently heard from the pit of the theatres. I notice the 
presence among the bourgeoisie of a restless younger gene- 
ration who will pour all the effervescence of the new move- 
ment into the old bottles of a disorganized society. The 
opposition will wax gradually stronger, working down from 
one social stratum to another, from the princes of the blood 
to the mass of the people, who are not yet infected. 

* Basoche was the term applied to the jurisdiction of the clerks to the solicitors 
of the Parliament of Paris. 



VI. 

THE PEOPLE. 

"r\0 you see, in the fields, those creatures like wild beasts, 
of both sexes, " burned black and red by the sun, 
crouching on the ground which they are digging and turn- 
ing up with unremitting persistence ? They have something 
like an articulate voice, and when they rise to their feet they 
exhibit the faces of human beings, — and such, in fact, they 
are. When night comes, they disappear in their dens, where 
they live on black bread, water, and roots. They save other 
men the trouble of sowing, ploughing, and reaping for a 
livelihood, and thus they well deserve a bit of the bread 
which they have sown." * 

Do you see them now, " in frightful misery, without beds 
or furniture, the greater part of them, for half the year even 
lacking the bread made of barley and oats which is their 
only sustenance, and which they are obliged to take from 
their own mouths and their children's to pay the taxes? " t 

Do you see " the poor slaves, beasts of burden fastened to 
a yoke, who toil painfully along under the lash," ^ the mis- 
erable wretches, the outcasts, who in famine years — and 

* La Bruy^re. f Massillon. J Marquis d'Argenson. 



36 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

they come with frightful frequency, those famine years — eat 
grass Hke sheep, and die, Uke flies, in swarms ? 

And yet, would one believe it, they do not complain. 
They do not so much as think of complaining. Their 
suffering and penury seem to them a part of the ordinary 
course of nature, like the winter or the frost. They do not 
complain. Why.? Because, though they lack bread for the 
body, they have that bread of the soul, — hope. Yes, the 
hope of heaven to come, of an ideal world as far superior to 
the real world as a gilded pavilion is to a foul sewer, — hope 
of the veritable fatherland, where there will be no more 
weariness, or tears, or sorrow ; hope their sustenance, their 
consolation, their vision of the future ; hope, that highest of 
all possessions, which the philosophes are determined at all 
hazards to wrest from them ! But they have something 
which the philosophes have not, — the sanctified poesy of the 
Church, its sad and joyous songs, the recurring cycle of its 
festal days, which give variety and charm to the year. They 
have, too, the church-tower of their native village ; the 
cemetery where their parents lie at rest, and whither they go 
to pray ; the crucifix, image of God the Son, whose feet and 
hands and side they kiss and bathe with their tears. They 
have that which ye have not, ye-freethinking men of the 
world, — the only real, inestimable treasure, which still sub- 
sists in all its force, even when the knell for the dying 
is sounding, against which death itself is powerless : they 
have faith ! Around each poor hut the angels of Christ are 
flying, — angels wlio, when the poor devils are tempted to 



The People. 37 

dash the bitter cup from their lips, induce them to drain it to 
the dregs with calm resignation. 

Ye great lords and noble dames, who swear by the 
" Enclyclopedie," men of learning and of letters, beware ! 
Perhaps you laugh at these poor wretches. You sneer at 
what you are pleased to call their ignorance, because they 
cling to the worship of the past, because they lay a cover 
for the dead on their ill-furnished board on All Saints' Day. 
You ridicule them because they spend their paltry savings for 
what ? To burn wax tapers to the Virgin. Be on your 
guard ; for if they do not burn these tapers, which you 
despise, it will be your houses and castles which they will 
burn. Do not scoff at these people of little account, these 
nobodies, for they outnumber you, and have only to close up 
their ranks to suffocate you. 

Ye great philosophes, why do you not endeavor to turn 
your marvellous, discoveries to account in effecting the salva- 
tion of that sacred object, the human soul, rescuing it from 
misery, and laying it upon God's bosom comforted and at 
peace? Oh, why need you be of that deplorable race of 
men who destroy souls ? Why do you turn aside from the 
cabin whose inmates are dying of hunger, from the work- 
shops where the proletariat, transformed into living parts 
of the machinery, can no longer breathe God's air, or warm 
themselves in his blessed sunlight.'* Beware, beware ' What 
will become of you when the day comes that the poor will 
say to you great nobles, " You are but men like the rest of 
us ! " to you prelates, " You are impostors ! " Beware, I sav ; 



38 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

for if your impious doctrines triumph, here are all these 
workmen and peasants, all the disinherited of fortune, who 
vv'ill cry out to you in a voice terrible to hear, " No more 
resignation, but vengeance ! No more tears, but guns ; and 
if there are no guns, pikes ; and if there are no pikes, clubs ! 
We are done with docility and foi'bearance and humility ! 
' Forward,' the cry ! " 

Madmen, madmen ! You say to them, " Poor fools, you 
are awaiting immortality to obtain the reward of your suffer- 
ing; but there is no immortality. Poor fools, you are hoard- 
ing your tears and sorrow like so much treasure, — those 
of your wives and your children, too, in the hope of laying 
them, after death, at the foot of God's throne ; but there is 
no God ! " 

Ye admirers of Helvetius, of Baron d'Holbach and 
Diderot, those shining lights of philosophy, beware ! The 
day when the incredulity of which you boast shall have made 
its way at last from your salons, your boudoirs, and your 
academies into the peasant's cabin, — on that day tremble 
ye, for the vengeance of Heaven will be at hand. 

The people are continually forgotten, whereas they are of 
all classes the one to be most sedulously kept in mind. It is 
in their ranks that royalty, strong and far-seeing, will always 
find the most reliable support of its material authority and 
its moral prestige. The people shed their sweat and their 
blood without a murmur. It is the people who, in time 
of peace as in war-time, in city and country, and upon 
the battle-field, give utterance with infectious enthusiasm, 



The People. 39 

with all the force of their robust lungs, to the cry which 
expresses in a breath the unity of the fatherland, — the cry 
of fidelity and patriotism, " Vive le Roi!" 

Reforms are absolutely necessary; but we need not look 
to a nobility saturated with Voltairianism, to a magistracy 
permeated by the spirit of rebellion, to secure the triumph of 
the two cardinal principles, order and liberty. Nor can we 
depend upon a bourgeoisie, which is, after all, but a feeble 
minority. No, it is to the people considered as a whole, — 
that is to say, the entire nation, — that we must appeal for the 
working out of real progress. Upon the common people, 
— not upon the privileged classes, but upon the common 
people, have the great reformers of the past always leaned 
for support. But that fact is overlooked in the apartments 
at Versailles. There, men are too busy with the superficial 
aspect of affairs to probe below the surface. Too much 
attention is paid to the mansions of the Faubourg Saint- 
Germain, the academies, salons, castles, and palaces of justice, 
and not enough thought is bestowed upon the garrets and 
hovels, upon the honest, devout masses, who would be such 
a mighty rampart for the Monarchy against the attacks of 
a revolution half aristocratic, and half bourgeois. There 
royalty might find the elixir of youth, and assurance for 
the future. The king ought to appear, not to the govern- 
ing classes alone, but to all his subjects, in the guise of a 
protector, a friend, and a father. Louis XV. is too prone to 
forget that of all the social strata of the eighteenth century, 
the best, the most worthy and patriotic, is that in which are 



/ 



40 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

found the poor and lowly, the working-men, the peasants, and 
the proletariat. There one must go in search of honesty, 
piety, and conscientious toil, — a welcome relief from the dis- 
graceful scandals of the court and the city; beneath those 
rough exteriors dwell souls of rare beauty. In that class, if 
royalty but understood the situation of affairs, lie the true 
bulwark of the throne, and the welfare of the country. 



VII. 

THE FEMALE POLITICIANS. 

AT Versailles, at Paris, throughout the kingdom in fact, 
women are coming to play a more and more important 
part. At Versailles they rule Louis XV. and his ministers ; 
at Paris they are the acknowledged arbiters of fashion, litera- 
ture, and art. Throughout the kingdom they are taking 
sweet revenge for the Salic law. 

In 1770, Colle writes in his Memoirs: "Women have so 
got the upper hand among Frenchmen, and have put them 
beneath the yoke so completely, that they no longer think 
and feel except at woman's bidding." Not all the women of 
influence are frivolous, empty-headed coquettes, like those 
who figure in the plays of Marivaux. Some such there are, 
to be sure ; but there are earnest, sober-minded women as 
well. There are pious women too, mothers of the Church, 
friends of the Jesuits, deadly enemies of the " Encyclopedic," 
— such women as the Princesse de Marsan, who shares with 
Madame de Talmont, Madame de Noailles, and the Due de 
Nivernais, the leadership of the so-called devout party. 

There are female philosophes as well, carried away by the 
latest craze, — the craze for irreligion, — and casting them- 
selves fearlessly into the sea of new doctrines with all the 
passionate abandonment of their sex. 



42 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

There are learned women, who develop a most remarkable 
aptitude for the most difficult sciences, and handle a compass 
as naturally as a fan; others, who place in their boudoirs, by 
the side of the little altar dedicated to Benevolence or 
Friendship, dictionaries of natural history, treatises on physics 
or chemistry ; others, who have their portraits painted, not in 
the guise of fascinating goddesses sitting upon a cloud, but as 
thoughtful divinities seated in a laboratory, surrounded by 
mathematical and astronomical instruments. 

There are female politicians, pupils of Rousseau, eulogists 
of the Contrat Social, dreaming of being the Egerias and 
Numas of the future, of changing their arm-chairs for the 
rostrum, and their salons for clubs, zealously preaching 
the merits of the Parliamentary system in vogue across the 
Channel, and declaiming like good citizenesses — the word was 
just coming into fashion — against the abuses and the turpi- 
tude of the absolute regime. They wish to be considered 
energetic. ("Energy," — another word which is becoming 
acclimated in the best society.) They pose as models of the 
patrician ladies of ancient Rome, passionately desirous of 
freedom. Their charming mouths open for the passage of 
weighty words. From the depths of their satin-hung bou- 
doirs flow eloquent denunciations of arbitrary power. These 
grandes dames of the liberal party — a novel type in French 
society — confide to Gustavus III., king of Sweden, their 
indignation with Louis XV. Read the letters of the Swedish 
monarch's regular correspondents, — Mesdames d'Egmont, 
de la Marck, de Croy, de Boufflers, de Mesmes, and de Lux- 



. The Female Politicians. 43 

embourg. There you will see with what vigorous language 
and nervous strength of style these fine ladies express their 
thoughts.* 

The beautiful and clever Comtesse d'Egmont, as serious- 
minded as her father, the Marechal de Richelieu, is frivolous, 
a charming creature, whose fate it was to die so young, and 
whose suffering and melancholy arouse such tender interest, 
— how violent and bitter and overflowing with virtuous 
indignation are her expressions with reference to the Du 
Barry's old lover ! 

" How can we bear it," she writes to Gustavus, " that he, 
who has tasted the celestial happiness of being passionately 
adored by his subjects, and who would be so adored to this 
day, had he left us the least opportunity to delude ourselves, 
should take pleasure in shattering all our hopes, and look 
unmoved upon such an entire change ! " 

Again she writes to the king of Sweden on the 27th 
June, 1771 : "Sire, they say that you have asked for Ma- 
dame du Barry's portrait ; they even go so far as to declare 
that you have written to her. I have denied it at all risks ; 
but the statement has been repeated to me so positively that 
I beg you to authorize me to deny it as positively. No, it 
cannot be." And on the 23d November, 1771: "I ask you 
once more to answer my question as to Madame du Barry's 
portrait. Be kind enough, I pray you, to give me your word 
of honor that you have it not, and never will have it, for I 
am very anxious to send you mine." 

* Gustave III. et la cour de France, par M. A. Goffroy. 



44 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

Madame de Boufflers writes to Gustavus in this tone: 
" Absolute power is a mortal disease, which, by imperceptibly 
corrupting the moral qualities of its possessors, ends by destroy- 
ing States. The acts of sovereigns have to undergo the 
censure of the whole world. France is doomed if the present 
administration continues." 

The Comtesse de la Marck, in a letter to the king of 
Sweden, draws the following picture of society at the close of 
the reign of Louis XV. : " Our young women are bursting 
with wit ; but as for the power of reasoning, one rarely hears 
it mentioned. They are all initiated into the secrets of the 
State, they have their fingers in every pie, and make love for 
pastime. Some repositories of wit there are, where God and 
religion are made a mockery, and where those who believe in 
God and religion are looked upon as fools ; such, in brief, is 
our plight. Healthy emulation and moral principle are alike 
abandoned; even in the stage-plays, everything is out of 
joint. We have one or two sculptors still, and three or four 
painters. Jewelry is still fashionable, but it will soon be out 
of date, for people buy nothing but diamonds now : to be 
sure, they do not pay for them. In a word, we have fallen 
very low, and ought to be content so long as we are not 
attacked ; for in that case I cannot imagine what would 
become of us." 

The movement has begun. Henceforth the women 
will be in the forefront of the opposition to the powers 
that be. The current sets in that direction, and they must 
float with it. The leading salons of Paris are so many 



The Female Politicians. 45 

rall3ang points of hostility to the king. Politics envelops 
everything. 

" Social gatherings, ostensibly for pleasures," says Besenval, 
"have become little States-General, where the ladies, trans- 
formed into legislators, discuss public affairs, and lay down 
principles with the assurance and self-sufficiency which they' 
derive from their longing to rule the roast, and to bring 
themselves into prominence, — a longing which is increased 
tenfold by the importance of the issue, and the noise it is 
making." 

Do not imagine, however, that most of these eloquent 
stateswomen, prating at random about the respective preroga- 
tives of the throne and the magistracy, absolute power and 
freedom, mean by that to renounce their customary wiles of 
coquetry, of what is called love. Be shy of these fine ladies, 
who are sober-minded only in appearance. Politics is but 
the pretext: love-making is the real motive. 



VIII. 

LOVE. 

OF all forms of love, the least common in the first society 
during the reign of Louis XV. is conjugal love. 
Well-bred married people occupy the position towards one 
another of courteous and diofnified strangers. The husband 
calls his wife Madame, and she calls him Monsieur. They 
live under the same roof, but have entirely distinct suites, and 
each gives the other notice of an intended visit. They never 
ride in the same carriage, they never meet in the same salon. 
A husband who followed his wife about would be laughed 
at as a jealous fellow, a country bumpkin. A woman who 
should have the extraordinary idea of falling in love with 
her husband would be overwhelmed with ridicule. Such 
a passion in society would not be comme il faut. Conjugal 
love is absolutely out of fashion. The Baron de Besenval 
is of opinion that " though this fact is perhaps destructive 
of good morals, society is an enormous gainer thereby." 
He adds, that, " relieved from the chilly embarrassment of 
the presence of the husbands, there is a sense of extreme 
freedom ; the flirting of the men and women keeps up 
the interest, and furnishes daily subjects for salacious 
adventures." 



Love. 47 

Salacious adventures, indeed, are sought on every hand. 
There is little thought of true passion, for pleasure is what 
is desired. Hear what a great lady has to say, in 1764, to the 
Due de Lauzun, the future Lovelace, whose education in the 
art of gallantry is not yet entirely concluded. 

" Believe me, my dear little cousin, romance is quite out 
of date ; it makes one ridiculous, and that is all. I took quite 
a fancy to you, my child ; it is not my fault if you mistook it 
for a grande passion, and made up your mind that it would 
never end. What difference does it make to you, so long as 
that fancy has passed away, whether I have taken a similar 
fancy to another, or remain without a lover ? You have 
many things in your favor in making yourself agreeable to 
the other sex: make good use of them to that end, and be 
sure that the loss of one can always be repaired by another. 
It is the only way to be happy and amiable." * Chamfort 
defines love as merely " The exchange of fancy, and the 
contact of person." Such are the morals a la mode. One 
takes it off in the same way that one puts it on. As 
the Prince de Ligne says : " One has been happy in the 
possession, and one is delighted to have ceased to pos- 
sess." 

Where are the good old days of heartfelt passion, of 
trembling avowals, of sighs and tears and despair.? Where 
the days of heroic attachments, with their accompaniment 
of chivalrous respect, long and weary waiting, sublime 
devotion, oaths of everlasting fidelity, unimpeachable dis- 

* Memoires of the Due de Lauzun. 



48 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

cretion, touching gratitude, and lofty and generous virtues ? 
Just look at the Cupid of the reign of Louis XV., the noisy, 
• insolent, triumphant Cupid, who bids contemptuous defiance 
to the true love of former days, as a mischievous, ill-bred 
child makes sport of an old man. Hear him, as he says, with 
his cunning leer : " Your lovers are only boobies ; they can do 
nothing but languish, and sigh ' Alas ! ' and tell their anguish 
to the neighboring echoes. I have suppressed the echo 
business. My subjects do not talk ; may I die if there is 
anything as much alive as they are. Languishing timidity 
and pink-and-white martyrdom are not in vogue now; all 
those things are insipid platitudes of bygone days. I do not 
put my subjects to sleep, I wake them up. They are so 
active that they have no leisure to be tender; their looks 
express their desires: instead of sighing, they attack at 
once. They do not say, ' Grant me the favor ! ' but take it 
for themselves ; and that is as it should be." * 

Hear Madame d'Epinay, who speaks of modesty as " A 
charming quality, which one fastens on with pins." 

Hear how the age boasts, with Crebillon fils, " of having 
at last got to the bottom of things," of having j^ut down what 
he calls " exaggerations, affectations, and grimaces." 

Listen to the materialistic language of Buffon himself, 
the grave and majestic Buffon : " Why does love make all 
other created beings happy, and man alone wretched ? Is it 
because only the physical side of that passion is attractive, 
and the moral side is of no account?"! 

*■ Marivau.x, La Reunion des Amours. 

t Buffon, Discours sur la nature tics animaus. 



Love. 49 

Thus we see that it is a well-understood rule, proclaimed 
by the great minds of the age, that the moral side of love 
must be suppressed first of all. Love is no longer repre- 
sented as a pretty little god, flying about, naked and free. 
The foes of ceremony and of long waiting form a sect of 
their own, the Antifagonniers. Another similar corporation 
dubs itself the Societe du Moment. To choose the moment 
wisely, that is the acme of the art. 

" How many liaisons have begun by active insolence, in a 
carriage whose driver is a shrewd fellow for going the longest 
way about, pretending to be deaf, and walking his horses .? 
Brutal love-making ends by having principles of its own, a 
certain sort of philosophy, and specious excuses. There are 
keen intellects, who decree that a bold lover has in reality 
more consideration for a woman than one of the bashful 
sort, and that he shows his respect for her to better purpose 
by sparing her the long agony of yielding one point after 
another." * 

To the lover vi^ho remains too long upon his knees, the 
eighteenth century cries. " Get up, and take your mistress in 
your arms ! " 

Very perverse and frivolous anci guilty is the society of 
the time of Louis XV. Very immoral are these galantes 
great ladies, the patricians of harlotry, who love scandal for 
scandal's sake, and take keen and haughty enjoyment in the 
loss of their reputation. We must, however, do them the 
justice to acknowledge that they preserve, amid all their 

* MM. de Goncourt, L' Amour au XVIIIe si^cle. i vol. Dentu. 

4 



50 The Last Years of Loiiis XV. 

demoralization, one quality which is lacking in many of the 
fashionable beauties of democratic times, — disinterested- 
ness. No, no, they bear no resemblance to you, selfish, 
treacherous, avaricious women, who combine with the 
ordinary vices of the courtesan a vice more odious than 
all the others, — hypocrisy ! — to you, abandoned creatures, 
who were born to give the lie to every real passion, every 
noble emotion ; to you, who know no remorse save that 
you have not sold yourselves sufficiently dear, and who, if 
by chance or mischance you should happen to yield once 
or twice to a veritable passion of the flesh, if not of the 
heart, would blame yourself without pity for such weakness, 
like a shopkeeper who is in despair because he has sold 
something for nothing. 

Ye sirens of low estate, women who amuse yourselves by 
laying snares for men of honor, and diverting yourselves 
with them as inferior wretches of no use except to arouse 
the self-love or prick the jealousy of your wealthy lovers, 
your complaisant financiers ; venal creatures, and venal with- 
out excuse, because your need of money is not for the 
necessaries of life, but for luxuries, for a jewel, a carriage, 
a box at the theatre, new toilets made by the latest 
fashionable dressmaker, — oh, ye degrading and degraded 
females, happily you are rare in the good society of the 
eighteenth century, much more rare than in democratic 
circles, where the salons are crowded with male and female 
parvenus living beyond their means, and venality, the death 
of true love, assumes frightful dimensions. From the great 



Love. 51 

ladies of the eighteenth century one asks at least the 
qualities of an honest woman, if not her virtue. In the 
best society of the epoch, love is immoral, indecent, and 
unblushing, but love does still exist. To be sure, it is not 
the elevated, magnanimous, inspired passion which moves 
the heroines of the great Corneille or the gentle Racine. It 
is not the ideal passion, purified by the spirit of self-sacrifice 
and by the burning flame of enthusiastic adoration. No, 
that sort of love is no more to be found. But love of some 
sort does still exist, or, even if it is but a simulacrum of the 
real thing, it is not at all events a vile traffic. 

Let us add, to be strictly just, that towards the close of 
the reign the level of sentiment began to rise a little. The 
" Nouvelle Heloi'se " gave a new turn to the erotic morals 
of France ; and if it is sometimes a bit declamatory, we 
can but admit that it has something of the element of 
spirituality. 

Buffon's sentiment is no longer approved, that "in choos- 
ing to yield to a sentimental passion, man simply abuses 
himself, and creates in his heart a void which nothing can 
fill." The fashion has changed ; affectation of passion 
takes the place of affected indifference. There is in 
Cythera's isle the figure of the sensitive man, the out-and- 
out lover. " Sensitiveness," that is the expressive word of 
the day. 

The Comtesse de Blot declares, at a reception given by 
the Duchesse de Chartres : " Unless endowed with super- 
human virtue, a really sensitive woman could refuse nothing 



52 The Last Years of Loicis XV. 

to Rousseau's passion." Formei'ly sarcasm and scepticism 
were the rule, but now enthusiasm has supplanted them. 
Declarations of love are philosophical disquisitions or 
tragical declamations. Every lover is an actor, who speaks 
his part with attitudes, inflections of the voice, emphasis 
and gestures all studied up beforehand. From one extreme 
we have gone to the other. Henceforth we see upon the 
stage of the salons the comedians of love, Don juans emeriti 
virtuosi in the art of sentiment. 

" Before everything else they aim at satisfying their own 
conceit, and congratulating themselves, prouder to end the 
comedy content with their own performance than with that 
of the lady concerned. To succeed in moving and grieving 
her, there are some who carry out upon their face the lie 
they are acting with their whole person, — who assume the 
airs of an old man, cover their faces with plaster, rub the 
powder off their hair, and make themselves pale by ceasing 
to drink wine. There are some even, who, to procure a 
definite rendezvous, will lay despair on their faces, as one 
lays on rouge ; with diluted gum Arabic they draw upon 
their cheeks the traces of tears but half wiped away." * 

They boast of returning to the worship of nature, of 
admiring the country, of being tender-hearted, and of 
possessing other common instincts of humanity. Whereas 
they used to deny the existence of love, they now parody it. 

* MM. de Goncourt. 



T 



IX. 

THE FAMOUS SALONS. 

HE leading salons of Paris are famous throughout 
Europe. They are the undisputed arbiters of style, 
and give society its tone. The women are enthroned there 
as sovereigns, give direction to the conversation, and by that 
means to pubHc opinion. The former standard of taste there 
becomes the interpreter of the new ideas. 

The most striking thing in society in the last years of 
Louis XV. is the constant diminution of the interval which 
separates the nobihty from the men of letters. 

" The haughty Marechale de Luxembourg always chooses 
La Harpe for her escort, for he has such a distinguished way 
of offering his arm. The man of humble birth not only 
obtains the entree of the salon, but he acquires a leading 
position there, if he has the talent to sustain it. The very 
first place in conversation, and indeed in the public esteem, 
belongs to Voltaire, the son of a notary; to Rousseau, the 
son of a clockmaker; and to D'Alembert, a foundling 
picked up by a glazier." * 

In Walpole's opinion, literature henceforth fills too great 
a place in social intercourse. " Literature," he writes, " is an 

* M. Taine, Origines de la France conteraporaine. 



54 The Last Years of Louis X V. 

excellent pastime, when one has nothing better to do ; but it 
becomes mere pedantry in society, and is a terrible bore when 
one makes a show of it in public. The authors whom one 
runs across everywhere are worse than their works, — which is 
not complimentary to either. In general, the prevailing tone 
of conversation is solemn and pedantic, and there is scarcely 
any amusement to be got out of it except in quarrelling." 

This judgment is a little harsh. After all, Paris still 
holds the sceptre, from a worldly standpoint, and foreign 
princes on their travels consider it an honor to be admitted 
to these salons, whose brilliancy and prestige are everywhere 
acknowledged. 

The Marechale de Luxembourg, whose first husband was 
the Due de Boufiflers, heroine of the famous chanson, — 

" Ouand Boufflers parut a la cour, 
On crut voir la mere d'Amour ; 
Chacun s'empressait a lui plaire, 
Et chacun I'avait a son tour," * — 

the Marechale de Luxembourg, adapting herself to the time, 
has amended her ways. "By means of a great name, unlim- 
ited assurance, and, above all, a hospitable mansion, she has 
succeeded in making people forget her former lapses, and in 
setting herself up as the sovereign arbiter of propriety and 
good form, and of those elements which enter into the com- 
position of refinement. Her empire over the young people 

* " When Boufiflers appe^ired at court, she was hailed as the mother of 
Love. Every one was extremely anxious to make hhnself agreeable to her, and 
each possessed her in turn." 



The Famous Salons. 55 

of both sexes is absolute : she restrains the giddiness of the 
young women, forces them to be entirely impersonal in their 
flirtations, and compels the young men to be moderate and 
considerate: in short, she maintains the sacred flame of 
French urbanity, and in her salon is preserved intact the 
tradition of noble and unaffected manners, which Europe 
has always admired, and tried in vain to imitate. Never 
was Roman censor of more service to the morals of the 
republic than the Marechale de Luxembourg has been to 
the attractiveness of society." * 

By her cleverness and her air of authority, by compelling 
a hearing, and, more than all else, by making herself feared, 
the Marechale has succeeded in acquiring consideration, and, 
more than that, respect. She rules the aristocratic, and the 
literary world also, with a firm and despotic hand. Presenta- 
tion at court is not enough now, one must also receive the 
approbation of Madame la Marechale de Luxembourg. Even 
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the irascible and morose Jean- 
Jacques, seems fascinated by this venerable dame. " I had 
hardly laid eyes upon her," he writes, "before I was under 
her spell. I found her charming, with the charm which time 
cannot dispel, and which has the most power over my heart. 
I expected to find her with a biting tongue, and overflow- 
ing with epigrams. But I found something much better 
than that. Madame de Luxembourg's conversation does not 
scintillate with wit ; there are no witty sallies, and nothing 
of what is properly called finesse ; but there is a pervading 
* Due de L^vis, Souvenirs et portraits. 



56 The Last Years of Louis XV, 

exquisite refinement and delicacy, which is never striking, 
but is always delightful. Her flattery is so much the more 
intoxicating because it is couched in such simple language. 
One would say that it passed her lips without being in her 
thoughts, and that her heart was overflowing, simply because 
it was too full." 

Another woman of superior parts, whose salon at Paris, 
at Versailles, and at Chanteloup is an aristocratic and intellec- 
tual centre of the first order, is the clever and virtuous 
Duchesse de Choiseul, wife of the famous minister. "In an 
age when every coterie has its own pliilosophe. who acts as 
its leading spirit, Madame de Choiseul thinks for herself. 
Neither the sarcasms of Voltaire nor the diatribes of Rous- 
seau disturb her sense of right or her keen discernment. She 
forms sound judgments of men and things, without allowing 
herself to be biassed by fashion or prejudice. In her salon 
one always recognizes an instinctive taste for the noble and 
the beautiful. Hers is a noble nature, which wins one's love 
at first sight, and in whose company one would discover 
every day some reason for loving her more." * 

The Duchesse de Choiseul will never be the dupe of 
Rousseau. " He has inculcated a good moral," she writes, 
speaking of the author of " La Nouvelle Heloise," "but a moral 
which we knew before, because there can be no other. But 
he has drawn from it dangerous and untrustworthy conclu- 
sions, or has put it in our power to draw them by the way in 

* Prosper Merimde, article in the "Moniteur universel " for 29th April, 1867. 



The Famous Salons. 57 

which he has set them forth. We ought always to be 
suspicious of metaphysics when applied to simple things. 
Fortunately for us, nothing is more simple than moral maxims; 
and the truest of all such is the one which comes most nearly 
home to our hearts : Do not do to another what you would not 
wish to have done to yoti. Everybody knows that, and under- 
stands it. There is no need of fine disquisitions upon good 
and bad morals, the origin of passion, prejudice, etc., and the 
hosts of other twaddle with which these gentlemen fill our 
newspapers and our book-stalls and libraries, to teach us 
what virtue is." 

The Duchesse de Choiseul is equally distrustful of Rous- 
seau when viewed as a moralist or as a political publicist. 
" I agree," she says, " that our prejudices must lead us into 
error as inevitably as abuses creep into the execution of the 
law ; but to desire to destroy everything, to correct the errors, 
is as if one should cut off a man's head to get rid. of a few 
white hairs. To employ one's intellect at the expense of 
public order is one of the worst of crimes. It is the sort of 
offence which is described by the parable of the tares in the 
Gospel. A worthy citizen will serve his country with mind 
and brain to the utmost of his ability; but he will not expend 
his talents in writing essays upon the social compact, to arouse 
suspicion of the legitimacy of governments, and to load us 
down with the weight of chains which we have never felt." 
Madame de Choiseul brings this edifying letter of 1 7th July, 
1776, to an end with these words : " I am always distrustful 
of this Rousseau, with his strange systems, his extraordinary 



58 The Last Years of Louis XV, 

costume, and his way of shouting his pulpit eloquence from 
the house-tops. He has always seemed to me to be an 
impostor posing as a virtuous man." 

The Duchesse de Choiseul is of a type which arouses our 
respect as well as our sympathy. If one shudders to see a 
Madame de Boufflers, the idol of the Temple, doing the 
honors of the Prince de Conti's household in company with 
Mademoiselle Auguste, the dancer from the Opera, or to see 
a Marechale de Mirepoix sitting upon the front seat of 
Madame de Pompadour's carriage, and Madame du Barry's 
after her, one is happy to meet a woman worthy of her 
exalted rank and her fortune, a woman who, at all times and 
in all places, sets an example of all that is honorable and 
beautiful and true. There is in her whole life such perfect 
purity, such virtuous and unpretentious charm in her 
attractive personality, and such a great mind in her small 
body. * 

" The Duchesse de Choiseul is not very pretty," writes 
Horace Walpole, " but she has beautiful eyes. She is a little 
model in wax, and for a long time was not allowed to speak, 
as she was deemed incapable of it, so bashful and modest 
is she. The court has hardly cured her modesty. Her 
bashfulness is compensated by the most fascinating voice, 
which makes one almost forget the extreme purity of her 
language, and the exquisite propriety of her expression. Oh ! 
she is the most refined, the most lovable and sweetest little 
creature that ever came out of an enchanted egg." 

* See M.Grasset's study of Madame de Choiseul et son temps, i vol. Dentu. 



The Famous Salons. 59 

The salons of the Marechale de Luxembourg and the 
Duchesse de Choiseul are notably aristocratic centres. From 
a literary standpoint, the three principal salons of Paris are 
those of Madame Geoffrin, the Marquise du Deffand, and 
Mademoiselle de Lespinasse. The first is in Rue St. 
Honore, the second in Rue St. Dominique, in one of the 
buildings of the Convent of St. Joseph, * and the third in 
Rue de Bellechasse. 

Madame Geoffrin's power is a characteristic sign of the 
times. Is this influential person a scion of a noble stock ? 
No. Her birth was of the obscurest. Who is her husband } 
One of the founders of the manufacture of mirrors, a very 
rich bourgeois, but extremely unprepossessing, and an abso- 
lute nullity as far as intellect is concerned. It is said that 
one day, one of the lady's friends, resuming her place in her 
salon, after quite a long absence, said, in a reminiscent vein : 
" Pray, what has become of the old gentleman who always 
sat at the foot of the table, and never spoke to anybody 1 " 
"Ah ! " replied Madame Geoffrin, " I know whom you 
mean. He is dead." " Really ! Who was he, pray } " 
"My husband." 

Is Madame Geoffrin literary t Not the least in the 
world. In fact, she is the personification of ignorance. She 
does not even know how to spell. Speaking of education, 
she says, " I have got along so well without it that I have 
never felt the need of it." 

Think of it ! At the close of the reign of Louis XV. 

* Now the Ministry of War. 



6o The Last Years of Louis XV. 

this woman of the people, without youth * or beauty, without 
talent or education, this old woman, who at any other time 
would have died in obscurity, is one of the principal powers 
in France, one of those who guide public opinion ! Her 
salon, celebrated throughout Europe, may be considered one ' 
of the institutions of the eighteenth century. The greatest 
nobles pay their court to her. Crowned heads actually do 
homage to her. When, in the month of June, 1766, she goes 
to pay a visit to her friend — I had almost said her protege — 
Stanislas Poniatowski, king of Poland, her journey is looked 
upon by all the courts as an event of political significance. 
At Warsaw she is received by the king as a dear mother, 
with all imaginable respect and delight and tenderness. At 
Vienna, the Empress Maria Theresa overwhelms her with 
attentions. A princess of the blood could not meet with a 
more flattering reception. The Czarina Catherine II. takes 
pleasure in writing affectionate letters to her, and attaches an 
extraordinary value to the correspondence. 

Why the prodigious success of this woman, — the excep- 
tional honor bestowed by France and by foreign nations 
upon one who ought in reality to marvel at the part she is 
playing ? Why ? Because Madame Geoff rin has been clever 
enough to create for herself a literary salon; because she 
invites artists and authors to dinner and supper; because she 
is one of those who loaned the money to found the " Ency- 
clopedie ; " because she has done more, perhaps, than any 
other one person to establish real sympathy between the aris- 

* She was born in 1699. 



The Famoiis Salons. 6i 

tocracy of birth and the aristocracy of talent. A vogue such 
as hers is always susceptible of some explanation. Madame 
Geoffrin understands — no one better — the art of hand- 
ling the exacting, vain, irritable race of artists and littera- 
teurs. Though she lacks wit, she has an abundant supply 
of tact and finesse, and of a certain sort of cleverness, 
combined with unfailing good-humor.* 

" Madame Geoffrin's manner," says the Baron de Glei- 
chen, " may be compared to La Fontaine's style. There is 
much art, but it is hidden. Everything about her seems 
very ordinary, and yet no one who tries to imitate her will 
ever equal her. Everything at her house is sensible, easy- 
going, convenient, useful, and unpretentious. Her bourgeois 
tone and her homely language give a piquant turn to her 
shrewd and sensible conversation." 

Horace Walpole also admires this past mistress in the art 
of maintaining a salon. He writes to Lady Hervey on the 
13th October, 1765: "Madame Geoffrin is a perfect prodigy 
of good sense, useful information, good and timely advice. 
She has a way of taking one which is fascinating to me. I 
Jiave never in my life seen anybody who was so quick to 
pounce upon one's defects, little vanities, and deceits, nor 
who could explain them to one so clearly, and convince one 
so easily. I never cared, as you know, about being told of 
my faults ; but you cannot imagine the pleasure which I have 
in her society. I take her for confessor and guide at once, 

* See the introduction by M. Cliarles de Mouy printed with the Correspon- 
dence of King Stanislas and Madam Geoffrin. Plon. i vol. 



62 The Last Years of Lotus XV. 

and I really begin to think that I shall end by becoming a 
reasonable creature, which I have never yet claimed to be. 
The next time I see her, I mean to say to her, ' O Com- 
mon-sense, take a seat, pray ! ' If she chose to take the 
trouble, I assure you, Madame, that she could lord it over 
me as if I were a mere child." 

The principal rival of Madame Geoffrin's salon is that 
of the Marquise du Deffand. She is no less representative 
of the grandes dames of the day than Madame Geoffrin of 
the bourgeoisie, and she is as well informed as Madame 
Geoffrin is ignorant. One of the two does not even know 
how to spell, while the other writes as well as the most 
famous authors. 

Both are well advanced in years, while their respective 
salons wield a preponderating influence in Paris. They are, 
in fact, very nearly of the same age. Madame Geoffrin was 
born in 1699, and Madame du Deffand in 1697, — a year 
after that Madame de Sevigne in whose wake she was to 
tread, and whose fame she was to jDarallel. 

The Marquise du Deffand is not only old, she is blind 
as .well. Her eyes, once so beautiful, which are said to 
have wrought such havoc, are dimmed and lustreless. But 
her lack of bodily eyes was more than supplied by the eyes 
of her mind, with which she sees everything. Seated night 
and day in the famous arm-chair which she calls her ionneau, 
this bright and clever blind woman is a power to be reckoned 
with. Her salon is an Areopagus whose decrees are not to 
be laughed aside. To be numbered among those who are 



The Famous Salons. 63 

admitted there is a very great distinction, a favor to be 
envied. To cross her threshold one must be a personage 
of note, whether in the book of heraldry or in the golden 
volume of literature* A procession of notables and 
celebrated people is passing in and out at all hours. It is a 
centre of intelligence which can furnish the key to every 
enigma, knows the ramifications of every intrigue, and is 
the nursery of all the new ideas. It is a salon devoted to 
literary and political diplomacy at once ; it might almost be 
called the official rendez-vous of the foreign diplomatists, 
who assemble there in quest of the material for their daily 
despatches to their respective governments. It is the place 
where all the burning questions of the day, of French or 
European interest, are dealt with in an extraordinary way 
by men of charming qualities, who converse, but do not 
argue, and who, while striving first of all to be agreeable, 
can in a moment pass, as Boileau has it, " from grave to gay, 
from joke to sober earnest." 

The sharp-tongued dowager presided at all the symposia 
with a sort of sovereign majesty. The prestige of her 
celebrity, the nervous eloquence of her speech, the purity of 
her style and language, her rank, her high connections, her 
marvellous wit, so quick, so keen, and 'So biting, make of her 
a woman to whose dominion the most unruly must per- 
force submit. She has the art of making herself feared. 
Woe to the poor wretch whose peculiarities she takes it into 

* See the monograph of M. de Lescure prefixed to the Correspondence of the 
Marquise du Deffand. 2 vols. Plon. 



64 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

her head to ridicule. She has, indeed, been well called the 
female Voltaire, the high-priestess of sarcasm. In her slim, 
nervous hands, the sceptre of intellect resembles a rod of 
chastisement. She is often amiable, but a very little thing 
is enough to irritate and embitter her ; and then her dreaded 
arm-chair becomes a tribune from which she pours forth the 
vials of her wrath, and lets fly all the shafts of satire. 

Hers is the leading Parisian salon. Her letters are 
models of style, marvels of clear and precise statement 
and of fine wit. No classical writer had ever a more irre- 
proachable mode of expression. As Madame de Sevigne 
personified the seventeenth century, so is Madame du 
Deffand the very incarnation of the eighteenth. Even 
Voltaire, in whose eyes she is the final awarder of fame, is 
so much in fear of her that he tries to insinuate himself 
into her good graces by pretending to be as blind as she. 
There is one man, however, who dares to defy the avenging 
thunderbolts of the Marquise du Deffand, and who for 
many reasons might well fear her; for he is a savant, aca- 
demician, man of the world, and philosophe, — D'Alembert. 
But it is all explained by this : D'Alembert is in love with 
the marquise's deadly foe. Mademoiselle de Lespinasse. 

The two rivals were fast friends in the beginning. Dur- 
ing the ten years from 1754 to 1764, they lived beneath the 
same roof. Mademoiselle de Lespinasse, who was an illegiti- 
mate daughter, born in 1732, of the Comtesse d'Albon, had 
had a hard road to travel. Poor, and without resource, she 
was only too glad at first to find shelter with Madame du 



The Famous Salons. 65 

Deffand. Without being at all pretty, she was bright, agree- 
able, and well informed, talked and wrote well, and concealed 
beneath a calm and reserved exterior a restless mind and 
feverish imagination. So she came at last to suffer torments 
in the secondary role she was playing, — a sort of literary 
servitude. 

The humble companion made a cotip d'etat. She artfully 
assembled in her own little apartment a select circle, limited 
to a chosen few, who came there in secret for a few moments 
before the hour at which the salon of the marquise was 
open to her friends. But some jealous tongue betrayed the 
secret, and her old blind mistress was informed of the scheme. 
Enraged by such a revolutionary proceeding, she pitilessly 
drove Mademoiselle de Lespinasse out of her house. 

The rupture between these two split Parisian society 
into two camps, one of which approved the action of the 
marquise, the other sympathizing with the younger woman. 
Mademoiselle de Lespinasse was by no means left without 
adherents. Her faithful friends, D'Alembert, Turgot, the 
Chevalier de Chastellux, the Abbe de Boismont, and the 
Archbishop of Aix, subscribed to assure her a modest, 
but independent, competence, and hired an apartment 
for her in Rue de Bellechasse. Her salon is not a very 
extensive one, but it is inspired by abundance of intellect 
and earnestness, and by most perfect sympathy among its 
frequenters, who are limited to a chosen few, and who find 
there more pleasure than in the great intellectual symposia 
of a Marquise du Deffand or a Madame Geoffrin. 

S 



66 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

They are very fascinating and very pleasant on the 
surface, these famous salons, which arouse the admiration of 
all Europe. But what a mass of inconsistencies and pitiful 
trifling do we find in this society of aristocrats by birth, 
wealth, or wit ! What dreary hours of discouragement, 
ennui, and disappointment do all these people know who 
amuse themselves thus, or, to speak more accurately, pretend 
to be amusing themselves ! Even Madame Geoffrin, for all 
her robust health, her common-sense, and equable disposition, 
has moments of anxiety and terror as she contemplates the 
work that is being done by these encyclopedisfes, to whom her 
services are without end. She opens her doors to them, 
shelters them with her influence, and furnishes them abun- 
dantly with funds, artisans of confusion that they are, 
wreckers of throne and altar together! While, by one of 
those strange inconsistencies so often met with in the 
eighteenth century, she is at heart a devoted royalist and 
devout churchwoman. The friend, confidante, and adviser of 
the greatest scoffers among "Csx^ philo sop lies and of the most 
dangerous materialists, the woman who by her bounty has 
made the publication of the " Encyclopedic " possible, con- 
fesses to a Capuchin, is most punctual in attendance at mass 
and other religious ceremonies at the church of St. Roch, 
and is very careful to have a priest at hand when any of 
her friends is in extremis. Sometimes it seems as if this 
aged woman, than whom no one is more addicted to repose 
and conservatism, had an instinctive foreboding that this 
house of hers, which seems so tranquil and peaceful, is 



The Famous Salons. 67 

really the cursed laboratory wherein the poisons which are 
to spread death and destruction among individuals and 
societies are being compounded in silence, by the light of 
the salon lamp, in the presence of a few choice spirits of 
destruction. 

Even Madame du Deffand has occasional fleeting yearn- 
ings for the solace which religion brings. At certain hours 
she has vague aspirations for a devout frame of mind, 
" which seems to her," as she says, " the happiest possible 
state." Bitterly does she sigh for that peace of heart and 
soul which is the gift of faith, and is the source of so much 
strength and comfort in this vale of tears. Despite her 
great powers of mind, she bends under the weight of an 
ennui that will not be driven away, and her letters are some- 
times despairing in tone. In the midst of her worldly 
pursuits, sublime in their utter emptiness, she gives voice 
here and there, with sinister eloquence, to thoughts which 
make one shudder. At such times her reflections, pregnant 
with deep thought and mental anguish, are as thrilling as 
Hamlet's soliloquy. Her arm-chair, which she calls her 
tonneau, she might call her tomb. She sits in it like 
one dead, who still has the sensation of living. To the 
man who has said, " Glissez, mortels, n'appuyez pas," to 
Voltaire, the superficial, this poor old creature, blind morally 
as well as physically, hesitating between longing for death 
and the dread of it, propounded with touching anxiety 
certain questions upon the terrible problems of the destiny 
of mankind. 



68 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

On the 1st of April, 1769, she wrote to him as follows: 
" Tell me why it is that though I detest living, I fear 
death. There is nothing to make me think that it will not 
be the end of everything with me ; on the other hand, I can 
see that my mind is going to pieces, as well as my body. 
Whatever is said to me on the one side or the other makes 
no impression on me. I listen to no voice but my own, and 
I can find nothing but doubt and darkness. ' Have faith,' 
some one says ; ' that is the surest way.' But how can one 
be expected to have faith in what one does not understand 1 
Things which I do not understand may exist, without doubt, 
and for that reason I do not deny their existence ; I am like 
one born deaf and blind. Such a one will agree that 
sounds and colors exist; but does he know what he is 
agreeing to ? If it were enough simply not to deny, well 
and good ; but it is not enough. How can one make up 
his mind between the finite and the infinite ; between 
emptiness and fulness? No one of my faculties can teach 
me; and what can I learn without them.? And yet, if I 
do not believe what I must believe, I am threatened with 
being thousands and thousands of times more wretched 
after I am dead than I have been in life. How shall I 
decide ; or is it possible for me to come to a decision } 
I ask you the question, you, whose character is so true 
that you ought through very sympathy to discern the truth, 
if it be discernible. You must teach me something about the 
other world, and tell me if we are fated to play a part there." 
To cap the climax of her woes, Madame du Deffand is 



The Famous Salons. 69 

the victim of anguish of the heart no less than mental 
anguish. She, who had never known the meaning of real 
love, plunged into a sort of ecstatic passion when she was 
wellnigh seventy years old. She has conceived for a man 
twenty years her junior, and who is more afraid of ridicule 
than anything in the world, the clever and satirical English- 
man, Horace Walpole, a strange affection, hesitating in a 
certain sense, and yet headstrong and jealous, which is more 
than friendship, but cannot be love. By a curious whim of 
fate, she falls in love, for the first time, at an age when it is 
no longer allowable to love even for the last time. 

Mademoiselle de Lespinasse is in some respects even 
more unfortunate than Madame du Deffand. This young 
woman, frivolous to all seeming, loves like Sappho, or the 
Portuguese nun, or like La Notivelle Heldise. Hers is a type 
of high-flown, ardent, frantic passion. She loves madly, to 
the point of insanity, a brilliant ofificer who does not care a 
fig for her, — M. de Guibert. She lives on her love, and 
dies of it. Her poor body and her poor soul are as if they 
were wrapped in the mantle of Nessus. One would say she 
was the victim of the fatalism in which the ancients believed. 
In the despair of her death agony she writes to her unfeeling 
lover : " Ah, how cruel men are ! Beside them tieers are 
angels of gentleness. I ought naturally to have devoted 
my energies to hatred of mankind ; but I have but ill ful- 
filled my destiny. I have loved much, and hated but little. I 
have not the strength to love any more ; my soul wearies 
and torments me, and it is of no use for me to live any 



70 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

longer. I have fever every day, and my doctor, who is not 
the most skilful of men, keeps dinning into my ears that I 
am wasting away with grief, and that my pulse and respi- 
ration alike denote acute mental suffering ; and he always 
says as he takes his leave, ' We have no cure for the 
soul.' " 

O worthy philosophes, think you that you know such a 
cure .? Authors of the " Encyclopedic," habihies of the 
famous salons, if you care to know the difference be- 
tween your philosophy and true faith, contrast the dying 
hours of one of your proselytes with those of a God- 
fearing Christian woman! 



X. 

THE PHILOSOPHES. 

^17"HERE are the days when La Bruyere wrote: "A man 
who is born a Christian and a Frenchman finds him- 
self restricted in the indulgence of his satirical vein, for 
great subjects are forbidden him." 

Where are the days when the advocate Barbier wrote these 
words in his journal : " I believe that a man should do what 
he has to do honorably and straightforwardly, without 
meddling with affairs of state, for which he has no capacity, 
and which do not concern him." 

Prudence, modesty, respect for authority, dread of shak- 
ing the foundations of the social structure, — i\\& philosopkes 
have done away with all that. The salons have become 
academies where politics and religion are discussed unend- 
ingly, by way of attacking the Church and the monarchy. 
In 1762 Bachaumont speaks of a deluge of pamphlets and 
political dissertations, " as disclosing a perfect rage for argu- 
ing about matters relating to finance and government." 

In 1765 Horace Walpole declares that "the atheists, 
who monopolize conversation, are declaiming as loudly 
against kings as against priests. They do nothing but 
preach, and their avowed doctrine is atheism. Voltaire him- 



72 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

self does not satisfy them. One of their fellowship said of 
him, ' Oh, he 's a mere bigot ; why, he 's a deist ! ' " 

The pJiilosophes are the heroes of the hour. Their 
doctrines have not yet permeated the mass of the people, 
but among the aristocrats, the wealthy bourgeoisie, the men 
of letters, the higher magistrates, and the financial magnates, 
they speak with the assured and lofty tone of masters. 
They are to be found in all the academies, in the mansion of 
every great noble, at all the fetes and all the elegant supper- 
parties. It is alleged that even some of the higher orders 
of the clergy are on friendly terms with them. Now that 
the day of the dandies has gone by, the philosophes are 
the fashion. A philosophe with his subversive ideas seems 
to be as necessary an appendage of a well-ordered salon 
as the candelabrum and its candles. Philosophy, before 
it became the most dangerous and threatening of facts, 
was a mere pastime, a fashionable form of entertainment in 
refined circles. The flame which is to consume the structure 
appears at first in the guise of a holiday illumination, an 
entertaining display of Bengal lights. The great nobles are 
playing with loaded guns, without a suspicion that they will 
explode. It is as if workmen while engaged in demolishing 
an edifice should have a delusion, and innocently fancy that 
they were building one. 

Extraordinary types of revolutionists these, with their 
lace ruffles, their fashionable oaths, their gold and crystal 
cups filled with an intoxicating but poisoned beverage, these 
QSLQ.VL\m-a.i& pJiilosophes, who, with a fascinating smile, languish- 



The Philosophes. ^^ 

ing glance, and soft and mellow accent, utter most impious 
sentiments, as one might recite an idyl or a madrigal. 

What strange functions are these supper-parties, where 
" the company consists of smiling women in full dress, and 
intelligent and attractive men, between whom there is perfect 
harmony and complete sympathy. With the second course 
their imaginations begin to work, bright sallies are heard on 
all sides, and keen wits begin to blaze and sparkle. When 
dessert arrives, can they resist the temptation to make witty 
remarks upon subjects the most grave.'' With the coffee, 
comes the great question of the immortality of the soul, and 
the existence of God." * 

Scepticism is looked upon as a mark of good fellowship ; 
they take pleasure in it, and glorify themselves upon it. The 
old-time aristocratic dulness has given place to a habit of 
joking, and making satirical allusions to sacred things. The 
Revolution still wears cuffs. Before assuming the carma- 
gnole, it is clothed in silk, and velvet coats. It will end with 
red caps, but it begins with red heels. 

There are many curious inconsistencies to be noted in all 
this. Let us listen to Walpole for a moment : — 

" From what I have said of their religious, I misfht better 
say irreligious, opinions, you must not conclude that the 
people of quality are atheists, — the men, at least. Happily 
for them, poor devils, they are incapable of going to such 
lengths of freethinking. They give their assent to many 
things, because they are a la mode, and because they don't 

* M. Taine, Origines de la France contemporaine. 



r 



74 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

know how to contradict them. They would be ashamed to 
stand up for the Roman CathoHc Church, because it is 
fashionable to gird at it ; but I am very sure that they really 
believe in it in their hearts." * 

The philosopkes themselves recoil from the contemplation 
of the results and the application of their doctrines. Diderot, 
in his " Projet d'Instruction publique pour la Russie," admits 
that " atheism is intended only for a few chosen thinkers, 
and is by no means adapted for the great body of society." 
Indeed, this alleged destroyer of religion and tyranny, who 
in a burst of mad passion wrote this frantic couplet, — 

"lEt ma main ourdirait les entrailles du pretre 
A defaut de cordon pour etrangler les rois," 

professes guileless admiration for the Empress Catherine II., 
goes to Russia to pay his respects to her, and accepts a mass 
of compliments and gifts from this sovereign of the North. 

Voltaire cries, in a moment of frankness, " The infamous 
thing," — such was the Patriarch of Ferney's name for the 
Catholic religion, — " the infamous thing is fit only for the 
riffraff, great and small." 

I read in Bachaumont, under date of April 23d, 1769, 
" From various letters which M. de Voltaire has written to 
people here, it is known that the great poet has repeated 
this year the edifying spectacle of last year, and has attended 
communion at Easter with a great show of piety, but some- 

* January 26, 1 766. Letters from Horace Walpole to his Friends during his 
Visits to France. Translated [into French], and preceded by an Introduction by 
the Comte de Baillon. Didier. 



The Philosophes. 75 

what less publicly ; he pleaded indisposition as a pretext for 
remaining in bed, and received the sacrament there. 

" They say that M. de Voltaire, annoyed by the com- 
plaints of the Bishop of Belley, who has been lamenting 
his unbelief, and his obstinate persistence in disseminating 
libellous attacks upon religion, determined to go through 
with this devotional function, and applied to certain notaries 
very recently to receive his profession of faith, which he has 
forwarded to Monseigneur. Whatever may be the truth as 
to this matter, which is told in various ways, it is easy to 
see, from several letters of his to different friends, how sin- 
cerely attached he is to religion, with what deep respect 
he regards it, and how eagerly and humbly he fulfils the 
duties of a true Catholic." 

I wonder if Bachaumont is in sober earnest when he 
expresses himself thus ? I would not answer for it. But 
there is one thing of which there is no doubt; and that is, 
that Voltaire has built at his own expense, close beside his 
chateau, a Catholic church, and that over the porch he has 
had engraved this inscription, which savors more of jDride 
than piety: Deo erexit Voltaire. 

Horace Walpole's good sense is revolted by such a sea of 
contradictions. " Atheism," he cries, " is a wretched dish, 
even though all the cooks in France exert their powers to 
compose new sauces for it. As for the soul, it may be that 
they do not have such things upon the Continent ; but I 
am inclined to think that we do have them in England. 
Shakspeare, for example, had several of them, in my opinion. 



76 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

I love the Jews, although they eat no pork, because they are 
better Christians than Voltaire." * 

The phlegmatic, methodical, courteous, liberal-minded 
Walpole, accustomed to the manners and morals of his 
own country, — Walpole, the friend of the Marquise du 
Deffand, the keen-witted habitue of salons, the man of 
fashion, — cannot accustom himself to the philosophes of 
France. In his eyes they are ill-bred, conceited, and tire- 
some. He accuses them of " having put on the mask of 
sobriety, believing that it was philosophical and English, 
and have acquired no new quality to take the place of their 
natural light-heartedness and animation. They have adopted 
contemptuous and constrained manners, instead of continu- 
ing to display their former frank impertinence, whose very 
absurdity made it easy to forgive." t 

What has become of the old-time French gayety? It 
is nought now but a reminiscence of our younger days. 
" Laughing has gone out of fashion as completely as jump- 
ing-jacks, and the old game of cup-and-ball," says Walpole. 
" Poor souls ! They have n't the time to laugh. The first 
thing to be thought about is how to make an end of God 
and the king. Every one of them, men and women, is 
busily engaged in the work of destruction. I am looked 
upon as one outside the pale because I still retain some 
slight belief in something; but that is not my only crime, 
for I have told them, and thereby ruined myself forever, 

* Letter of March 17, 1771. 
, t Letter of 25 January, 1766. 



The Philosophes. 77 

that they have borrowed from us the two most tedious 
things we have, — whist and Richardson." * 

" I would have been glad to send the philosophes to 
Heaven, although they scarcely care about going there, they 
are so impertinent and ill-bred. I used sometimes to go to 
Baron d' Holbach's ; but I have given up his dinner-parties, 
for I was tired to death of his authors, his philosophes., 
and his scholars, of whom he always has his dovecote full. 
He had wellnigh turned my head with a new theory of 
antediluvian floods, which they have invented to prove the 
immortality of matter." f 

All this philosophical and scientific confusion wearied 
the clever Briton, and made him dizzy. Perpetual blasphemy 
made him doubly fond of religion. " Don't be surprised," he 
cries, " if you hear that I have suddenly become a Jesuit." 

The gilded salons resplendent with light and animation, 
the perfumed boudoirs filled with flowers, where marquises 
and duchesses, bepowdered, and covered with glistening 
gems, and great nobles in coats of many hued velvet, vied 
with one another in unreasoning invective against the Christ, 
made him long to leave it all, and repair to some lonely 
cloister far away from the philosophes, there in peace to 
meditate. 

" When I am tired out with their madness," he says again, 
" I seek an asylum at the Chartreuse, :j: where I am tempted 
to prefer Lesueur to all the painters of my acquaintance." 

* Letter of October 19, 1765. \ Letter of December 5, 1765. 

% The Carthusian convent, Rue d'Enfer. Lesueur's Galerie de Bruno, now in 
the Musde du Louvre, was then at the convent. 



78 Tke Last Years of Louis XV. 

He never revisited the Carthusian convent without deep 
emotion. In 1739 he had said: "One finds there all the 
surroundings which conduce to sadness, reflection, and de- 
spair; and yet one is glad to be there." But in 1771, his 
feeling is not so keen ; on the 9th of July he writes : " I 
do not take half the pleasure I used in visiting the churches 
and convents. The consciousness that the dream is at an 
end, and the absence of the earnestness so essential in every- 
thing which concerns religion, impart to these places the 
aspect of theatres doomed to destruction. The monks run 
here and there as if they had not long to stay there; and 
things which for half a day seemed sacred to me, are now 
unpleasant and gloomy." 

Who can say that the fashionable impiety has not already 
made its way into these abodes of piety, where used to be 
found such chaste emotion and such sweet comfort t The 
saints carved on the Gothic structure no longer seem so 
venerable as of old. The variegated rays of the stained 
glass windows no longer have their pristine mystic clear- 
ness. The tones of the organ are less triumphant, less 
stirring. Walpole grows melancholy over the spirit of the 
time, the cursed breath which corrupts and dries up the soul. 
The same feeling of vague unrest, of apprehension and dis- 
couragement, exists in many minds and in many hearts. 
Amid this society, rotten to the core, notwithstanding its 
brilliancy, and the paint and patches which disfigure the 
cheeks of the fashionable beauties to hide their pallor, how 
many are trying to divert their thoughts by frivolity, like 



The Philosophes. 79 

those timid persons who whistle to keep up their courage ! 
In the sohtude of their own thoughts, when they are 
divorced for a moment from the tumult of their world, and 
thrown back upon their own resources, what do all these 
successful characters, male or female, find to say to them- 
selves ? What are their thoughts when the lights of the 
feast are extinguished, the flowers withered, and the soft, 
clear light of day appears, after a night of blatant impiety 
and fictitious enjoyment ? 



PART SECOND. 



THE WOMEN OF THE COURT AT VERSAILLES AT THE 
CLOSE OF THE REIGN OF LOUIS XV. 
1 768-1 774. 

I. 

LOUIS XV. IN 1768. 

IV/TARIE LECZINSKA was no more, and Versailles, 
bowed with grief, presented a melancholy and 
depressing appearance. Mademoiselle Genet, the future 
Madame Campan, who had been for some da5's installed 
as reader to Mesdames de France* was deeply impressed 
by the gloomy aspect of the chateau. " These vast rooms 
draped in black," she wrote ; " the state chairs, placed sev- 
eral steps higher than the floor, with a canopy trimmed with 
plumes stretched above them ; the caparisoned horses, the 
great funeral procession, all in deep mourning ; the huge 
shoulder-knots, trimmed with gold and silver spangles, which 
embellished the livery of the pages, and of the footmen as 
well, — all this paraphernalia of mourning produced such an 

* Daughters of the king. 
6 



82 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

effect upon my feelings that I could scarcely stand when I 
was taken to the apartments of the princesses. The first 
day that I read to them in Madame Victoire's cabinet, I 
found it impossible to read more than two sentences, for 
my heart was beating wildly, my voice trembled, and I 
could scarcely see." 

In two years and a half Louis XV. had lost his son, 
his daughter-in-law, and his wife. The deaths of these three, 
met in each instance with saintly and touching resignation, 
were well calculated to arouse for a moment in his heart a 
feeling of repentance and of the need of religious con- 
solation. During the long and painful illness of Marie 
Leczinska, he had devoted himself to her with such affec- 
tionate assiduity that the poor queen, little accustomed to 
so much consideration, could not begin to show how grateful 
she was. After she had ceased to breathe, her husband, 
with sincere and deep emotion, imprinted a last kiss upon 
her icy brow. 

People thought that such oft-repeated warnings would 
not be without effect upon him. Louis XV. was fifty-eight 
years old. His surgeon advised him to follow a life of 
virtue, as healthful for the body as for the soul; he urged 
him not simply to put on a drag, but to unharness the 
horses. 

Vice, though pardonable to a certain extent in a young 
man, is shameful, absurd, and revolting in one whose hair 
is gray. Eyerything conspired to induce the king to mend 
his ways, — his physical condition, his honor, his interest, his 



Louis XV. in 1768. 83 

conscience, the voice of public opinion, the call of morality 
and religion, the dignity of the throne, and the welfare of 
his soul. 

For four years, — that is to say, since the death of Ma- 
dame de Pompadour, — he had had no titular mistress. The 
Parc-aux-Cerfs was not closed, but the obscure orgies of 
that mysterious establishment did not cause such deplorable 
scandal among courtiers or the people at large as a royal 
favorite enthroned in the palace of Versailles. Louis XV. 
was much attached to his four remaining daughters, Mes- 
dames Adelaide, Victoire, Sophie, and Louise; and it was 
hoped that their influence would tend to lead their father 
back into the ways of righteousness. The Most Christian 
King had religious faith, and there was room to believe that, 
with passions moderated by approaching old age, he would 
at last atone for the bad example he had set, by a life of 
piety and respectability. It may be that he himself longed 
to make his peace with God ; but the force of habit, the 
selfish promptings of those who trade upon vice, and a 
sort of mad impulse were destined to gain another victory 
over his sense of right and his remorse. 

The dominating sentiment in the heart of Louis XV. 
was not religious enthusiasm, but a mixture of apathy and 
heedlessness. Men who have reigned for many years, 
whether they end their days upon the throne, or abdicate, 
or die in exile, are almost invariably, towards the close of 
their career, the victims of a sort of weariness and disgust 
with things in general. They have witnessed so many 



84 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

intrigues, so many base acts, so many recantations ; they 
have been the object of so much insipid flattery and sick- 
ening adulation ; they are so well versed in the sinuosities 
of the human soul, — that they finally come to hold mankind 
in supreme contempt. This feeling does not arouse them 
to anger; it is rather tranquil, indolent, and disdainful. 
The sovereign who has had long experience - no longer 
indulges in any illusions on his own account, or as to 
other people. To every suggestion, he is tempted to 
reply , " What is the use t " 

Ministers, courtiers, mistresses, and more humble sub- 
jects alike arouse his suspicious distrust. There are 
moments when he longs to let the machine run itself, 
so sad are his memories of the past, and so bitter his 
discouragement for the present. As an old pilot watches 
from the shore the struggling of a storm-driven bark, 
which he is powerless to aid, so the monarch sees from 
his palace the ship of state foundering in the distance, 
and mutters sadly to himself that he has not even the 
power to rescue the crew. 

His mind agitated by presentiments of evil, Louis XV. 
no longer believed in the prestige of his throne, still less 
in the future of his race. He resorted to paltry ex- 
pedients, pitiful tricks, and plots against himself, with 
the hope of re-establishing his tottering power. As 
Madame Campan well observes, " To distinguish Louis de 
Bourbon from the kins: of France was the most interest- 
ing object of the royal existence." 



Louis XV. in 1768. 85 

" They would have it so ; they thought it was for the 
best," was his invariable formula when the plans of his 
ministers failed of success. He reigned in two persons, 
so to speak, having two domestic and two foreign policies, 
a private treasure-chest, and a secret, underground gov- 
ernment, working in opposition to the ofificial one. 

As M. de Bontaric says : " As a man, he passed part 
of his life in impeding and thwarting the king. What 
an extraordinary spectacle ! An absolute monarch reduced 
to the most obscure intrigues as a means of accomplishing 
his will, which he did not dare to declare aloud ; waging 
a bitter but under-hand war against his ministers, and, after 
all, deceived in his expectations, his self-esteem wounded, 
conspirator emeritus, persisting to his dying hour in schemes 
which were known to all the world, and saved by nothing 
but his exalted rank from sharing the captivity or exile of 
his agents — I had almost said his accomplices ! " 

This explains the presence in his secret diplomatic 
corps of such persons as the Chevalier d'Eon, who was 
man and woman by turns, and the celebrated Comte de 
Saint-Germain, who claimed to be several centuries old, and 
was supposed to possess a most potent elixir of life. Baron 
de Gleichen says, in his " Souvenirs " that " this claim 
was responsible for the invention of the absurd fable of 
the old lady's maid whose mistress had a phial of the 
divine fluid hidden away : the old soitbrette found it, and 
drank so much of it that she overdid the business of 
rejuvenating, and became a little baby." 



86 The Last Years of Louis X V. 

This backstairs diplomatic body included some adven- 
turers, but it also contained some remarkable men. The 
Comte de Broglie was the leader. This mysterious 
ministry of Foreign Affairs was in operation contempo- 
raneously with the official ministry. 

" Before long it had trustworthy agents at all the 
courts : sometimes it was the resident minister, who thus 
performed a twofold duty, without the knowledge of the 
titular Minister of Foreign Affairs ; more frequently it 
was some subordinate official of the legation, who thus 
became a spy upon the actions of his immediate superior. 
M. d'Ogny, director of the secret post-ofitice, recognizes by 
a mark on the outside the despatches of the diplomats 
who were in the secret ; they were sent to the Comte de 
Broglie by Guinard, a page at the palace, deciphered 
in the Comte 's cabinet, and then handed over to Louis ~ 
XV., with drafts of the proposed replies, to which the 
king affixed his signature, after making such corrections 
as he saw fit. The Baron de Breteuil, ambassador to 
Sweden in 1766, whom the king had requested to follow 
the course of events in that country with particular 
attention, the Comte Desalleurs, ambassador at Constan- 
tinople, M. de Vergennes, and M. de Saint-Priest were 
members of the secret body.* 

The Comte de Broglie continued to superintend it 
even after he was exiled, as the result of an official dis- 
grace which was really of no importance. To quote M. 

* Gustave III. et la Cour de France, par M. A. Geffroy. 



Louis XV. in 1768. 87 

Geffroy once more: "Louis XV., with the assistance of 
these unknown agents, took pleasure in guiding the prin- 
cipal transactions himself. It may be that he was jealous 
of the horde of ministers, favorites, and mistresses by whom 
he was encompassed, and was glad of an opportunity to 
thwart them and fight them under cover, and to conspire 
against them, without taking the trouble to resist them 
openly. His underground policy was frequently more to 
his credit than the declared policy of the cabinet of 
Versailles." 

M. Theophile Lavallee has reached a similar conclu- 
sion. " The secret correspondence of Louis XV.," he 
says, "proves that prince to have had, by royal instinct 
and family tradition, a deep sense of national greatness ; 
it overflows with good sense, dignity, and patriotism. One 
cannot peruse it without deploring that so lofty a policy 
should have been sterilized by lack of strength of will, 
and that such deep insight into the true interests of 
France in the future should have gone for nought in the 
orgies of the Parc-aux-Cerfs." 

Louis XV. did not lack intelligence, — he had that 
quality in abundance ; nor did he lack moral sense, for 
while he was doing what was wrong, he had a very clear 
idea of the right. No, what he lacked was will-power, 
strength of purpose. He had had in his youthful days, 
and from time to time he still displayed, upright and 
clean intentions ; but he was not animated with a suffi- 
cient degree of energy to repel the torrent of the 



88 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

century's vice. In the words of his huntsman, Le Roy, 
whom Sainte-Beuve calls " a La Bruyere on horseback," 
" he despaired of ever being able to do what was right, 
because one is always inclined to look upon that which 
one lacks the courage to do, as impossible. To this 
point had this man gradually come, who, if he had been 
born to private life, would have been deemed, by virtue 
of his intellect and character, above the common herd, 
and what is properly called un galant hammer 

Despite his advancing years, he had preserved his 
graceful and commanding figure, and regular features ; he 
was still somewhat reserved in conversation, but always 
refined and clever; his courtesy was beyond criticism, and 
he was extremely careful of his personal appearance. 

" The king was still beloved by his people ; they might 
well have hoped that he would at least adopt a manner 
of life suited to his years and his dignity, which would 
serve to throw a veil over the errors of the past, and 
justify the affection which Frenchmen had bestowed upon 
him in his youth. It was very hard to visit severe 
condemnation upon him. When he enthroned titular 
mistresses at court, they blamed the queen's excessive 
piety. They found fault with Mesdames because they did 
not foresee and seek to prevent the danger which would 
attend the king's forming an intimate circle around some 
new favorite. They sighed for Madame Henriette, twin- 
sister of the Duchess of Parma : that princess had some 
influence upon the king; and if she had lived, she would 



Louis XV. m 1768. 89 

have devoted herself to entertaining him in the bosom of 
his family, she would have attended the king in his little 
excursions, and would have done the honors of the 
little supper-parties which he loved so to give in his 
apartments." * 

The Comte de Segur, a man of wit and of society, 
who saw the last years of Louis XV., also speaks of him 
with a certain amount of sympathy. " This weak but 
well-meaning monarch," he says, in his charming Memoirs, 
" was in his youth the object of enthusiastic admiration 
which was little deserved ; the harsh strictures upon his 
old age were no less exaggerated. Inheritor of the ab- 
solute power of Louis XIV., he reigned for sixty years 
without once laying himself open to the charge of having 
used his power cruelly. It is hard to find a prince who 
has not shared, to a greater or less degree, in the errors, 
the weaknesses, and follies of his time. Moreover, the 
French have always shown too little severity for offences 
of this description ; but they demand at least that the 
stains shall disappear in the splendor of some ray of 
glory. In that event they become only too forgiving, and 
almost utter panegyrics upon these same faults, as com- 
mitted by the chivalrous Fran9ois I., the gallant Henri 
IV., and the majestic Louis XIV., while they make them 
the subject of bitter reproach to Louis XV." 

Sovereigns are almost always the personification of the 
age in which they live. They seem to make the law, 

* Mdmoires de Madame Campan. 



go The Last Years of Louis XV. 

whereas on most occasions they simply follow it. The 
strongly contrasted characteristics of Louis XV. are re- 
produced in the society of which he was the head. He 
belongs to that period of dissolution and decomposition 
when, in the words of Chateaubriand, " Statesmen became 
men of letters and vice versa, great nobles became bank- 
ers, and farmers-general great nobles. The fashions were 
as absurd as art was degenerate : shepherdesses in paniers 
were painted on the walls of salons where colonels 
sat over the embroidery frame. Everything was out of 
joint in men's minds and their morals, — a sure sign of 
impending revolution. To see the monarch slumbering 
in the lap of debauchery, corrupt courtiers, designing or 
incapable ministers, philosophes attacking religion and the 
State; the nobles either ignorant, or tainted with the pre- 
vailing vices ; ecclesiastics at Paris the disgrace of their 
order, and in the provinces slaves of prejudice : looking 
upon all these, one would have said they were a crowd 
of workmen in a tremendous hurry to tear down a noble 
edifice." 

And yet there was no noticeable change. As the 
Comte de Segur says, " The old social structure was 
undermined throughout its whole extent, and yet no 
exterior marks indicated that it was almost ready to fall. 
The change of morals was unobserved, because it had 
been gradual ; the court etiquette was unchanged ; there 
were the same throne, the same names, the same distinc- 
tions of rank, the same formalities. The Parliaments, 



Louis XV. in 1768. 91 

defying the power of the throne, albeit with outward 
expressions of respect, had become almost republican 
without suspecting it, and they were themselves giving 
the signal for revolution, while they thought that they 
were simply following the examples of their predecessors 
when they resisted the concordat of Fran9ois I., and the 
fiscal despotism of Mazarin." 

Louis XV., who, notwithstanding his many faults, was 
a shrewd and perspicacious observer, fully appreciated the 
gravity of the situation. But to apply an effective rem- 
edy, something more was needed than clever management 
or learning or wisdom : downright genius was indispen- 
sable. In the last years of the eighteenth century, to 
harmonize the freedom that had become necessary, with 
absolute authority, was a problem which the greatest and 
wisest of mankind might not have succeeded in solving. 
Louis XV. contented himself with saying, " Things will 
endure in their present shape as long as I live." 

By his side reigned a minister whose character pre- 
sented a most striking contrast to that of his master. 
In the same degree that Louis was reserved, taciturn, and 
bored, the Due de Choiseul was impulsive, voluble, ana 
good-humored. In the same degree that the monarch, 
albeit his piety, was but ill understood, had a deep and 
earnest religious faith, the minister was a disciple and 
follower of Voltaire. Beloved by parliamentarians, aristo- 
crats, and men of letters alike, bel esprit and courtier 
rather than statesman, Choiseul, with his impatience and 



92 77^1? Last Years of Loins XV. 

audacity, his facility and brilliant capacity for affairs, his 
charming and never-failing learning, his entertaining and 
eloquent conversation, his faith in his lucky star, his 
habit of believing all manner of success attainable, his 
philosophy, which drew the line after Voltaire, and 
despised Rousseau, his inconsequent lavishness, which 
caused him no uneasiness on the score of the immense 
chasm it dug beneath the throne, because he relied upon 
the coming suppression of the monasteries and the tax 
upon ecclesiastical property to make up the deficit, — 
Choiseul was a perfect specimen of that courageous, 
fascinating, light-headed, and venturesome nobility which 
was marching laughingly on towards an abyss hidden by 
flowers. 

" Never," said the Baron de Gleichen, in his " Souvenirs," 
" have I known a man who could scatter joy and con- 
tentment wherever he went, as he could. When he entered 
a room, he seemed to rummage in his pocket, and take 
from it an inexhaustible supply of jokes and gayety." 

Notwithstanding his fascination and his good nature, the 
minister, whom Pope Benedict XIV. described as "a mad- 
man with a great deal of brains," had stirred up irrecon- 
cilable hatred in some hearts. His rivals and jealous 
detractors could not forgive his great eminence, and 
anxiously deliberated how best they could succeed in over- 
turning the colossus which towered above everybody. In 
what salon, by what means, could they hope to plot and 
accomplish the downfall of this man who tormented them 



Louis XV. in 1768. 93 

so: that was the question which they put to themselves 
and one another unceasingly. 

As Madame Campan observes, Louis at this time had 
relations with no women except those of a class so low 
that they could not be used for an intrigue which was 
likely to be of some duration ; especially as the Parc-aux- 
Cerfs was a little harem whose inmates were constantly 
changing. The enemies of the omnipotent minister 
desired to fix the monarch's attention upon some one 
mistress who, by persistent, daily representations might 
succeed in overthrowing him. As a counterfoil to the 
grand vizier, a sultana was essential. Animated by such 
purposes, the enemies of the Due de Choiseul cast their 
eyes upon the woman whose origin we are now about to 
recount, — the Comtesse du Barry. 



II- 

THE EARLY HISTORY OF THE COMTESSE DU BARRY. 

ON the 9th January, 1829, a curious lawsuit was 
argued before the civil tribunal of original juris- 
diction at Paris. The litigants were members of two 
families, each of which claimed to be the only true heirs 
of the Comtesse du Barry, and they were contending 
for a legacy bequeathed to the comtesse by the Due de 
Cosse-Brissac, who was slaughtered by the revolutionists 
in 1792. The due, naming his daughter, Madame de 
Mortemart, as sole legatee, had encumbered the succes- 
sion with this legacy, which at first could not be paid. 
But under the Restoration, the Mortemart family having 
received a large share of the indemnity of a milliard 
granted to the emigres, found itself in a position to carry 
out the last wishes of the Due de Brissac. 

The Gomard heirs presented themselves as claimants 
for the legacy, relying upon the following alleged extract 
from the baptismal register of the parish of Vaucouleurs, 
in the diocese of Toul, as the birth-certificate of Madame 
du Barry : — 

" Jeanne, daughter of Jean-Jacques Gomard de Vaubernier and 
Anne Becu, called Quantigny, was born the 19th August, 1746, 



Early History of the Comtesse du Barry. 95 

baptized the same day, having for godfather Joseph de Mange, and 
for godmother Jeanne de Birabin, who have signed with me. 

L. GALON, Vicar of Vaucouleurs. 
JOSEPH DE MANGE. 
JEANNE DE BIRABIN. 

The heirs on the mother's side, the Becus, also came 
forward. They came, not only to claim their rights, but 
to contest the right of the Gomards to the inheritance of 
Madame du Barry. They maintained that the certificate 
produced by the latter was fictitious ; that it had been 
invented in 1768 to flatter the comtesse; and they pro- 
duced in opposition to it another certificate, taken from 
the registers of the civil jurisdiction of the town of 
Vaucouleurs on the 25th September, 1827, and thus 
conceived : — 

" Jeanne, natural daughter of Anne B^cu, called Quantigny, was 
born the 19th August, 1743, and baptized the same day. She had 
for godfather Joseph Demange, and for godmother Jeanne Birabin." 

By decree of the 9th January, 1829, — affirmed by the 
Cour Royale of Paris the 22d February, 1830, — the 
court of first instance of the Seine decided in favor of 
the Becu heirs. The certificate produced by the Gomards 
was declared to be apocryphal. The court also found 
that in 1768 a genealogy had been obligingly made to 
order for the mistress of Louis XV. They had under- 
taken to transform an illegitimate into a legitimate child : 
the filia nullius Becu was metamorphosed into Miss 
Gomard de Vaubernier. The particle was bestowed upon 
the godfather, Joseph Demange, who became Joseph de 



96 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

Mange, while the godmother, Jeanne Birabin — la Bira- 
bine, as they called her in the country — figured as 
Madame de Birabin. The flattery of the courtiers went 
even farther than this. They rejuvenated the favorite, so 
to speak, and fixed the date of her birth, not upon the 
19th August, 1743, when she actually was born, but three 
years later, the 19th August, 1746. 

M. Le Roi, the extremely well-informed custodian of 
the library at Versailles, has told the truth concerning the 
origin of Madame du Barry in his very interesting work, 
" Curiosites Historiques." He gives her her true name, — 
Jeanne Becu, — and proves the falsity of innumerable 
fables which have had a tendency to create an absolutely 
baseless legend on the subject of the royal mistress. 

The child, who was one day to be called Madame la 
Comtesse du Barry, was the daughter of a peasant 
mother. From the cradle she had to struggle with 
adversity. A provisions contractor, M. Dumonceau, pro- 
vided the means to procure an elementary education for 
her, solely from charity. He placed her in the convent of 
St. Anne, with a trousseau consisting of two pairs of 
sheets and six towels. It was said that she peddled 
haberdashery at a later period; and after that, under the 
name of Mademoiselle Ran9on, which was the name of 
her mother's husband, she entered the employ of one 
Labille, man-milliner. Rue Saint-Honore. 

It would appear that the young shop-girl was not a 
pattern of virtue. Alas ! with all the snares which beset 



Early History of the Comtesse du Barry. 97 

the feet of pretty girls, virtue and beauty are almost 
incompatible among the poorer classes. The milliner fell 
in with one of those men who are common in all capi- 
tals, Comte Jean du Barry. He told himself that such a 
fascinating young person ought to make her way in the 
world, and in a burst of enthusiasm he applied a seraphic 
appellation to his divinity; he called her Mademoiselle 
I'Ange [Miss Angel]. This angel, of an inferior category, 
presided at the gambling parties which the comte gave. 
It was at one of these that Dumouriez saw her in 1764. 
In the same year the Due de Lauzun followed her 
when she left the Bal de I'Opera, and found her ravish- 
ingly beautiful. Lebel, Louis' valet-de-ckambre, who by 
reason of his peculiar functions was on the watch for 
suitable morsels for the king, thought that he would do 
well to put Mademoiselle I'Ange upon his list. He fancied 
that she would be a mere bird of passage, and would dis- 
appear, after a momentary incumbency of the Parc-aux- 
Cerfs. He was in error. The former milliner was destined 
to occupy a post which had been vacant for four years, — 
the post of successor to the Marquise de Pompadour. 

Instead of aping the manners of the great ladies who 
wearied the king beyond measure, she showed herself as 
she was, a courtesan pure and simple, with all the cyni- 
cism, impulsiveness, and tricks of her trade. Louis felt his 
jaded senses awakened as if by a miracle. He was in 
raptures, and the new favorite seemed to him an ex- 
ceptional being. He longed to cover her with a shower 



98 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

of gold and jewels, and to make her the queen of all the 
mistresses of France or of Europe. 

In his opinion an unmarried woman could not with 
propriety fulfill the duties of the office, and he speedily 
determined to transform her into a woman with a husband, 
and a title as well. Nothing was more easy than to find a 
nominal spouse, who would be well content to disappear with 
well-filled pockets, and never appear on the scene again. 

This lucrative role Comte Jean du Barry was unable 
to assume himself, because he already had a wife ; but 
he had a bachelor brother who seemed to have been born 
for the occasion. This obliging fellow was called Comte 
Guillaume du Barry; he was an indigent officer of 
marines, and lived with his mother at Toulouse. To 
summon him to Paris, marry him to Louis' mistress, 
give him a comfortable sum of money, and send him 
back to Toulouse, was a matter of only a day or two. 

Queen Marie Leczinska died on the 24th June, 1768. 
Her husband mourned her but a short time, for during 
the month following he became enamoured of this so- 
called Jeanne Gomard de Vaubernier, this Anne Becu, 
called I'Ange, the future Madame la Comtesse du Barry. 
It was on the 23d July that the marriage contract was 
executed before the notaries of the Chatelet at Paris, and 
on the ist September this farcical union was solemnized 
at the church of St. Laurent at Auteuil. The nuptial 
blessing was no sooner pronounced than the groom was 
off for Toulouse, while the bride took up her abode at 



Early History of the Comtesse du Barry. 99 

the palace of Versailles. At the same time all Paris was 

humming the chanson of the " Bourbonnaise," a commonplace 

tune which did not deserve the popularity it attained : — 

" La Bourbonnaise, 
Arrivant a Paris, 
A gagne des louis. 
La Bourbonnaise 
A gagne des louis 
Chez un marquis. 

" Pour apanage 
Elle avait la beaut6 ; 
L'esprit, la volupt6, 
Pour apanage : 
Mais ce petit tresor 
Lui vaut de Tor. 

" Dc paysanne, 
Elle est dame a present, 
Elle est dame a present, — 
Mais grosse dame; 
Porte les falbalas 
De haut en bas. 

" Fille gentille, 
Ne desesp^rez pas ; 
Quand on des appas, 
Qu'on est gentille, 
On trouve tot ou tard 
Pareil hasard." * 

* Translation : " La Bourbonnaise, on arriving at Paris, earned good wages in 
the establishment of a marquis. 

"For stoclv-in-trade she had beauty, wit, and easy virtue; but this small out- 
fit was a mint to her. 

" From being a peasant, she has now become a lady, — a vulgar lady, to be sure ; 
she is all furbelowed from top to toe. 

" My pretty girl, do not despair. When one has influence, and is pretty, one is 
sure to find such a chance sooner or later." 



too 



The Last Years of Louis XV. 



Another chanson also went the rounds at Versailles. 
It was the new mistress's song of victor)^ ; for she already 
had her train of courtiers and poets : — 

" Lisette, ta beauts s6duit 
Et charmq tout le monde ; 
En vain la duchesse en rougit, 
Et la princesse en gronde. 
Chacun sait que V6nus naquit 
De r^cume de I'dnde. 

" En vit-elle moins tous les dieux 
Lui rendre un juste hommage, 
Et Paris, ce berger fameux, 
Lui donner I'avantage, 
Meme sur la reine des cieux 
Et Minerva la sage? 

" Dans le serail du Grand Seigneur 
Quelle est la favorite? 
C'est la plus belle au gr6 du ccEur 
Du maitre qui I'habite; 
C'est le seul titre a sa faveur, 
Et c'est le vrai merite." * 

Louis XV. congratulated himself upon his choice. 
Madame du Barry was neither educated nor clever. She 
did not like to talk politics ; she had no relatives at 

* Translation : " Lisette, thy beauty fascinates and entrances all the world. 
In vain does the duchess blush that it is so, and the princess grumble about it. 
Every one knows that Venus was born of the foam of the sea. 

" Was it the less true that she had all the gods at her feet, and that Paris, the 
famous shepherd, gave her the preference over the queen of Olympus herself, 
and the sage Minerva ? 

" In the seraglio of the Grand Seigneur who is the favorite ? She who is 
the loveliest in the eyes of the master who dwells there. It is the only way to his 
favor, and is the true reward of merit." 



Early History of the Comtesse dii Barry. loi 

court, — and these were very great recommendations in the 
eyes of the monarch. He would not have cared for 
another grande dame, like the Duchesse de Chateauroux. 
who would have arrived with a long procession of rela- 
tives and proteges, nor a politician in petticoats, like 
Madame de Pompadour, who would be forever stirring 
up the parliaments and the clergy. What he wanted 
was somebody to entertain him, — not a mentor. 



III. 

THE COMTESSE DU BARRY'S TRIUMPH. 

WHAT will be the fate of the Comtesse du Barry? 
Will she be merely the ephemeral fancy of a day, 
like the damsels of the Parc-aux-Cerfs, or will she occupy 
officially the post of favorite ? That was the question 
which everybody was asking. The important point was, 
whether she would or would not be presented. Bets 
were freely made upon this question at Versailles. The 
Due de Choiseul, who looked askance upon the new 
comtesse, was opposed to her being presented; but the 
king desired that she should be, and in the end he had 
his way. He had made Madame du Barry's acquaintance 
in July, 1768, but it was not until the 2 2d April, 1769, 
that she was formally presented to him. 

The ceremony was performed with the usual form- 
alities. After receiving the orders of the king, who had 
been advised of the names of the lady making the 
presentation, or sponsor, and her two associates, who 
must always be ladies of the court circle, the recipient of 
the honor appeared at the door of the large cabinet, in 
full dress ; that is to say, with her gown spread out upon a 
petticoat four ells and a half wide, with a long mantle 



The Comtesse.du Barry s Triumph. 103 

clasped at the waist, bodice to match, drooping feathers, and 
as many diamonds as she could make out to secure. 

The Comtesse du Barry was presented by the Comtesse 
de Beam. Louis' face was radiant with the joy which he 
felt in the triumph of the woman upon whom his choice 
had fallen. His days of fickleness were at an end. 
Madame du Barry needed no assistance in retaining her 
hold upon the affections of her royal lover, who was weary 
of his secret visits to the Parc-aux-Cerfs, for the neces- 
sity of keejaing them secret made them burdensome to 
him. He closed the mysterious establishment, and fur- 
nished his new inamorata with apartments in the palace of 
Versailles, just above the suite which he occupied himself. 
He could visit her at any hour, without being seen, by 
a secret staircase leading from the Cour des Cerfs. A 
door opened upon a little landing, whence he could 
enter one of the closets adjoining the recess in the favor- 
ite's room. Her suite was a succession of boudoirs, each 
more charming than the others. It was the apotheosis of 
luxury. The clock in the bedroom represented the three 
Graces holding a vase in which was a revolving dial, and 
above was Cupid, pointing with his arrow to the hour. 
Most exquisite objects of art, marvels of decorative work, 
bronze, marble, lacquer, porcelain, and statuettes were 
scattered about in the greatest profusion in this paradise 
of debauchery. 

" It was the wild dream of a courtesan," say MM. 
de Goncourt ; " it was luxurious extravagance and profu- 



I04 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

sion gone mad. There were millions lavished upon fashion- 
able whims, upon rare bits of bijouterie, lace, silk, and velvet ; 
a perfect torrent of wealth; the royal treasury flowing out 
through the hands of a pretty woman upon tailors, dress- 
makers, and milliners." 

Her life, passed entirely in furnishing and refurnish- 
ing, in giving orders and receiving bills, in making 
her toilet, and in buying everything under the sun, was a 
life of caprice and whim. Her apartments in the palace 
did not satisfy her, and Louis gave her a mansion in the 
town in Rue de I'Orangerie,* where she quartered her 
servants and her dependants. 

At the beginning of 1769, she received an annuity of 
100,000 livres charged upon the city of Paris, and an 
income of 10,000 livres upon the States of Bourgogne. 
On the 24th July of that year her generous lover, whose 
passion for her was ever growing, did homage to her 
charms by the gift of the beautiful chateau of Luciennes, 
purchased from the Due de Penthievre. 

The favorite fairly revelled in her triumph. She had 
as fine an establishment, as great wealth, and as lofty a 
position as the Marquise de Pompadour had had. 

Young, beautiful, and more than fascinating, with blue 
eyes, brown eyebrows, fair hair, a little Greek nose, red 
lips, a skin like satin, a sweet face with a touch of mis- 
chief in her expression, she shone with all the brilliancy 
of her twenty-five years. She was not a goddess of 

* This mansion is to-day No. 2 in that street. 



The Comtesse du Barry s Triumph. 105 

majestic mien, but a frolicsome, lively beauty, who, when 
arrayed in her most magnificent toilets, had an air of 
charming carelessness and insouciance. It is impossible 
to deny her charms. Louis XV. was like one bewitched. 

The Marechal de Richelieu, who was so harsh in his 
treatment of the Marquise de Pompadour, gave his un- 
stinted approval to Madame la Comtesse du Barry. On 
the 25th June, 1769, the Marquise du Deffand wrote as 
follows to Horace Walpole : — 

" The other day, in the country, while the master of 

the house (the king) was at his whist, the leader of the 

conspiracy (Richelieu) got up a little game of lansquenet 

to teach the mistress of the mansion (Madame du Barry), 

He lost two hundred and fifty louis. The master of the 

house laughed at him, and asked him how he came to lose 

at such a game as that. He replied by a passage from an 

opera : — 

" ' Le plus sage 
S'enflamme et s'engage, 
Sans savoir comment' * 

The master laughed, and so did all the troop." 

However, there were some persons who declined to go 
into raptures over the new favorite's charms of person. 
Horace Walpole saw her in the chapel at Versailles in 
September, 1769. His admiration was very lukewarm, and 
he thus described the impression she made upon him, in 

* Translation : "The wisest of men may lose his head and find himself 
involved, without knowing how." 



io6 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

a letter to George Montagu : " A front bench in the 
gallery had been reserved for us. Madame du Barry 
took her place below and opposite us ; she was without 
rouge or powder, and indeed her toilet was not made. A 
strange way to exhibit herself, for she was near the altar, 
in the midst of the court, and where she could be seen 
by everybody! She is pretty, if one looks closely at her; 
yet there is so little out of the common in her appear- 
ance that I should never have dreamed of asking who 
she was. There was no insolence or arrogance or 
affectation in her demeanor. Her husband's sister was 
with her. In the upper gallery I espied, among a lot of 
prelates, the king, who is still a fine-looking man. One 
could but smile at this conglomeration of piety, parade, 
and vice." 

Madame du Barry was the first to wonder at her own 
fate. Her transformation into a great lady seemed to 
her only a disguise. She was even more surprised when 
they undertook to make a politician of her. With no 
hatred to indulge, no ambition to gratify, and no schemes 
to execute, she asked only to be left to her toilets and 
decorations. Politics to her mind was an unmitigated 
bore. What had she to do with parliaments and clergy 
and diplomacy.? She had very different matters in her 
head. Since her first day at court, her only aim had 
been to live on amicable terms with the ministers. She 
sent word to the Due de Choiseul that if he chose to 
be on friendly terms with her, she was ready to meet him 



The Comtesse du Barry s Triumph. 107 

half way. The person intrusted with this conciliatory 
message recalled the fact that mistresses overthrew min- 
isters, but that the converse was not true. The due 
contented himself by replying with a cold and indefinite 
promise to grant such requests of Madame du Barry as 
were just. The minister's enemies had very great diffi- 
culty, despite their unremitting urgency, in driving the 
pacific comtesse to the resolution to take up arms against 
him. At first her assaults upon him were mere skir- 
mishes, — feints it would be better to say. The Marquise 
du Defland wrote to Horace Walpole on the 2d No- 
vember, 1 769 : " Grandpapa (a sobriquet bestowed upon 
Choiseul) receives little slights every day, such as not 
being invited to the supper-parties in the cabinets ; and, 
at Madame du Barry's, when he is her partner at 
whist, grimaces and witticisms and shrugs of the shoul- 
ders, — in short, all varieties of petty boarding-school 
malice." 

However, Choiseul's friends did not yet feel alarmed. 
On the 15th January, 1770, Madame du Deffand wrote, 
still to Walpole : " La dame du Barry seems to gain no 
influence, and there is no appearance that she ever will. 
She has neither affection nor dislike for anybody; she 
can say what she is told to say, like a parrot, but she is 
entirely free from ulterior views, selfishness, or passion. 
It is not with such dispositions as hers that one succeeds 
in acquiring power." 

But the confidence of the marquise as to the Due de 



io8 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

Choiseul's security did not long endure, " The Controller- 
General is at Madame du Barry's feet, and does not 
blush to be there," she wrote on the 3d March, 1770; 
" he is following, so he says, the example of all ministers 
who desire to retain the ear of kings, and to be useful to 
them. So far our friend is all right, but I doubt whether 
the year will pass without great changes." In the same 
letter, she added : " The king is still very much in love, 
but without exhibiting any great amount of consideration 
for the lady, whom he treats much like any courtesan. 
However, she will behave well or ill according to the per- 
son who governs her: her own character counts for 
nothing. She may be able to assist in fulfilling the 
desires of other people, but never with the energy and 
success which she would have if she shared them herself. 
She will repeat her lesson, but on any point on which 
she has not been coached, her own wit will never supply 
the deficiency." 

About this time a malicious skit was put in circulation, 
which is quoted in one of the letters of the marquise 
(the 2d November, 1769). It was supposed to recite the 
grievances of the Due de Choiseul, friend of Madame de 
Pompadour, and foe of Madame du Barry. It was sung 
to the tune of " Vive le Vin, vive I'Amour ! " 

" Vive le Roi ! Foin de I'Amour ! 
Le drole m'a joue d'un tour, 
Qui peut confondre mon audace. 
La Du Barry, pour moi de glace, 



The Comtesse du Barry s Trmmpk. 109 

Va, dit-on, changer mes destins. 
Jadis, je dus ma fortune aux catins; 
Je leur devrai done ma disgrace." * 

Madame du Barry allowed herself to be drawn into 
the struggle almost in spite of herself. Three men urged 
her to it, — the Due d' Aiguillon, the Abbe Terray, and the 
Chancellor Maupeou. Surrounded by this triumvirate, the 
comtesse smilingly entered the lists of politics. We can 
easily understand how great must have been the indig- 
nation felt by so proud and bold a man as the Due de 
Choiseul upon finding himself confronted by such an 
adversary. He chafed at his bit. His power was doomed 
to last but a few months more; but before his fall he was 
to witness the arrival in France of the princess whose 
marriage with the dauphin had been negotiated by him, — 
that charming poetic maiden who brightened up the dull 
court like a ray of purest sunshine; that touching victim 
of a cruel fate, whose lovely yet august figure forms a 
startling contrast to that of the Du Barry, and whose 
name one cannot utter except with an indescribable feel- 
ing of sympathy and pity and respectful emotion, — Marie- 
Antoinette. 

At the moment when all minds were full of the ap- 
proaching marriage of the young archduchess to the 
prince who was one day to be known as Louis XVI., a 

* Translation : " Vive le roil a plague upon Love ! The wretch has played me 
a trick which may be too much even for my assurance and conceit. La Du Barry, 
cold as ice to me, will change my future prospects, they say. In the first place, 
I owed my good fortune to harlots, and I shall owe my disgrace to them." 



no The Last Years of Louis XV. 

novice at the Carmelite convent of St. Denis was pray- 
ing for the welfare of France, threatened with dire 
disaster. That novice was one of the daughters of Louis 
XV. While selfish licentiousness reigned supreme at the 
palace of Versailles, the spirit of self-sacrifice sought shel- 
ter in a convent near the last abode of the French kings. 
Madame du Barry was the scandal of the age ; Madame 
Louise de France its edification. 



IV. 

MADAME LOUISE DE FRANCE, INMATE OF THE CARMELITE 

CONVENT. 

IT was in 1770, Madame Louise de France, youngest of 
the daughters of the king, was in her thirty-third year. 
" For several years," says Madame Campan, " Madame 
Louise lived in strict seclusion. I used to read to her five 
hours a day : my voice often expressed the weariness of my 
chest, and the princess would prepare eau sucree, and put it 
by my side, apologizing for making me read so long, by 
pleading the importance of finishing a course of reading 
which she had marked out for herself." 

Why was this king's daughter in such haste to finish 
this course of reading ? That was her secret. Apparently 
she led a life of luxury ; really she was quietly serving a 
mysterious apprenticeship in renunciation and self-sacrifice, 
accustoming herself to bear extreme heat or cold, and to 
wear beneath her fine linen the coarse serge worn by the 
Carmelites. In the evening, when she was alone in her 
apartment, she would put out her wax candles, and light 
tallow ones, so as to become used to the odor, which at first 
she could hardly endure. " Hers was a noble soul," says 
Madame Campan ; " she loved noble things, and she has 
often interrupted my reading to exclaim, ' Oh, how grand, 



112 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

how noble ! ' She had it in her power to do but one glori- 
ous deed, — to exchange a palace for a cell, and her fine 
clothes for a robe of sackcloth. She did it." 

Some writers, who, having no religious feeling themselves, 
insist upon keeping their eyes always on the earth, and never 
looking heavenward, have undertaken to ascribe the pious 
resolution of Madame Louise to worldly motives, and they 
come dangerously near representing a Carmelite nun as an 
ambitious schemer. M. Honore Bonhomme, author of the 
work entitled, " Louis XV. et sa Famille," takes a juster view 
of the subject when he says : " When the queen died, 
Louis XV. had a spasm of repentance ; there was reason to 
think that he would change his habits for the better : but no. 
Soon a new favorite, the Du Barry, made her appearance, and 
we know what followed. Now, it was after this notorious re- 
lapse of her father, it was when she saw that he had plunged, 
body and soul, deeper than ever into the shameful sea of 
vice, that Madame Louise, torn with grief, and utterly hope- 
less, hastened to pray to God in the austere seclusion of the 
cloister, not for pardon for herself, — she needed it not ; not 
for the peace and tranquillity which she lacked, — she had 
voluntarily sacrificed them ; but she prayed to God with 
heartfelt, tearful fervor for her father's conversion, for the 
salvation of the king's soul." 

On the 2 2d April, 1769, Madame du Barry was officially 
presented at court; on the 30th January, 1770, Madame 
Louise instructed Monseigneur de Beaumont, Archbishop 
of Paris, to ask the king's leave for her to enter the 
convent. 



Madame Louise de France. 113 

Louis, deeply moved and profoundly surprised at so 
unexpected a communication, was dumb at first. At last he 
exclaimed several times, " It is cruel ! it is cruel ! " and 
postponed his reply for two weeks. But he finally gave his 
consent. The Abbe Terray, the princess's confessor, 
brought her a letter from the king, dated the 20th February, 
1770, which ran thus: — 

" Monseigneur the Archbishop, my dear daughter, having com- 
municated to me all that you have said and written to him, will 
surely have reported to you all that I said to him in reply. If it 
is for God alone, I can make no opposition to his will and determina- 
tion. You should have reflected solemnly, so I have nothing more 
to ask you. It would seem that your plans are all made ; you can 
mention it to your sisters whenever you think best. Compiegne is 
out of the question ; outside of that you can choose where you will, 
and I should be very sorry to force your inclination in any way. I 
have made enforced sacrifices, but this will be entirely voluntary on 
your part. May God give you strength to support your new life, for 
when you have taken the step, you cannot retract it. I embrace you 
with all my heart, my dear daughter, and give you my blessing." 

There was at St. Denis a Carmelite monastery in such 
straits financially that the nuns had been obliged to retrench 
in the matter of food, which was frugal enough before, and 
the baker had begun to refuse them bread. It was this 
establishment, reduced to the last extremity, and threatened 
with extinction, from lack of funds, which Madame Louise 
selected for her asylum. Just when the nuns were under- 
going a nine days' fast, and beseeching God to insure the 
continued existence of their community, Louis XV. gave 
to his daughter the consent which she so earnestly sought. 

8 



114 The Last Years of Lo^lis XV. 

Madame Louise still kept her purpose entirely secret, par- 
ticularly from her sisters, whose comments she dreaded. 

On the 5th April, she received the following note, dated 
at Choisy, from her father : — 

" I embrace you with all my heart, my dear daughter ; I send 
you the order for your departure, which you mention, and I will do 
what you wish for your servants, and will carry out all your other 
arrangements. You will have only a word from me to-night, my 
little heart, for it is late." 

On the nth April, in the morning, the princess took 
carriage at Versailles, attended by a maid of honor and an 
equerry, giving the order : " To St. Denis." She wore a 
silk dress under a great black cape, and a high bonnet with 
a red bow. Upon reaching St. Denis, she said, " To the 
Carmelites." 

The door of the cloister opened, and Madame Louise dis- 
appeared. Her maid of honor, the Princesse de Ghistelles, 
and her equerry, M. d'Haranguier de Quincerot, supposed 
that she would come out again as soon as mass had been 
said. Imagine their amazement when the princess sent 
word to them from within, and they read the order of 
the king ! 

The sisters of the novice learned during the day what 
had happened. At first they were in despair ; but after 
the first flush of indignation, they came to feel only the 
deepest respect for so devout a resolution. In his valuable 
work upon the Daughters of Louis XV., M. Edouard de 
Barthelemy quotes the letters of Madame Adelaide and 



Madame Louise de France. 115 

Madame Sophie to their sister. Madame Adelaide wrote as 
follows : ■ — 

" You can imagine better than I can describe what my heart has 
felt and still feels. My grief was quite equal to my surprise ; but 
you are happy, and I am content. Pray God for me, my dear 
heart : you know my needs, and they are more urgent to-day than 
ever. I shall certainly come to see you as soon as I can, — as soon 
as I have the strength and you feel like receiving me without 
putting yourself out. Adieu, my dear heart ! I am going to 
vespers, where I fear I may be a little inattentive. Love me 
always, and believe that I return it tenfold." 

Madame Sophie's letter was in these words: — " 

" If I had not told you again and again, dear heart, that I 
suspected you of a longing to become a nun, I believe you would 
never have done it. I forgive you freely for not mentioning it to 
me. Your sacrifice is noble, because it is entirely voluntary; but do 
you suppose that the involuntary sacrifice which you impose upon 
me in thus abandoning us is any easier to bear.' Never for an 
instant doubt my love, dear heart, or that I shall love you all my 
life, and shall come to see you in all haste as soon as you will 
permit me. I embrace you with all my heart." 

A circular letter to the king's representatives at foreign 
courts notified them of the "exemplary and touching event" 
which had occurred, and the Pope, Clement XIV., wrote 
the Most Chi'istian King a letter which read like a song 
of thanksgiving. 

Madame Campan relates that the first time she visited 
the princess at the convent, she met her coming out of the 
laundry, where her royal hands had been at work in the tub. 
Said she to her former reader : " I sadly abused your young 



Ii6 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

lungs for two years before I carried out my plan. I knew 
that here I could only read such books as tend to secure 
our salvation, and I was anxious to run through all the 
historical writers who had aroused my interest." Going on 
to speak of her chosen lot in life, she said : " Believe me 
when I say that the moral writers are right in declaring that 
true happiness does not dwell in palaces ; I have become 
convinced of that. If you wish to be happy, I advise you 
to seek a retreat like this, where the activity of one's mind 
can content itself with uplifting aspirations towards a better 
world than this." 

The grated doors closed forever upon the daughter 
of Louis XV. The chasm between the world and her 
became impassable. What a contrast between the palace 
and the cloister! Yesterday, all the splendor and magnifi- 
cence of radiant galleries, marble stairways, and stately 
apartments ; to-day, humility, poverty, and the rigorous and 
monotonous conventual existence! Yesterday, robes of gold 
and brocade, laces, precious gems, and diadems ; to-day, the 
robe of sackcloth and the earthen cup! Yesterday, the 
festive animation of the bristling world ; to-day, the silence 
and gloom of the grave. 

It is said that certain courtiers, misunderstanding the 
motives of Madame Louise, criticised or pitied her ; that the 
Marechale de Mirepoix called her " a madwoman, who had 
entered the convent to make trouble at court, under the 
cloak of Heaven;" that the Due d'Ayen thought he was 
very clever when he said : " If Madame Louiae is in such 



Madame Louise de France. W] 

a hurry to get to Paradise, she may be very certain of not 
passing eternity with her family." 

The Marquise du Deffand, playing the pkilosopke, 
writes in one of her letters : " This exploit has not made 
a very great sensation. People shrug their shoulders, 
pity her weak-mindedness, and go on to talk of some- 
thing else." 

The satirical marquise has much compassion for a 
princess who, as she puts it, " makes herself miserable for 
a whim." Madame du Deffand is in error; with all her 
wit, she is herself more deserving of compassion than 
Madame Louise. There are vastly more whims in her 
salofi than in the Carmelite convent. As for Louis XV., 
at the bottom of his heart he thinks his daughter fortunate. 
" But, Sire," said Madame du Barry one day, " Madame 
Louise will have a wretched life at the convent." " Not at 
all," he replied; "she will be more nearly at peace than 
any other of the family. Quietism was not invented for 
nothing." 

It may even be that it sometimes happened to him, 
dissipated prince that he was, to conceive a distaste for 
his palaces, and to feel what might be called homesick for 
the cloister. Charles V. is not the only sovereign who 
has dreamed of living the life of a monk. Even the most 
abandoned voluptuaries have their occasional moments of 
mysticism. 

The daughter of the terrestrial king now puts her trust 
in the King of Heaven. As she is no longer bound to the 



ii8 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

perishable throne, but to the imperishable, immortal Cross, 
she experiences, in her voluntary captivity, a higher sense 
of freedom than she ever knew in the vortex of the court. 
No, no, she has no regretful thoughts of the mob of 
courtiers crowding about the doors of the CEil-de-Boeuf. 
She has no sigh for the splendors of the palace, where care 
and anxiety dwell, where, as La Bruyere has it, one rises 
and retires upon selfishness. She longs not for the vulgar 
fawning, the deafening clamor which wearies the ear and 
the heart alike ; the protestations of zealous affection, 
which are prompted only by selfish scheming, ambition, and 
greed ; the pomp and vain show which afford not a 
moment of true happiness. The rules of the cloister, 
strict and harsh as they are, seem less irksome than the 
bonds of etiquette. To all worldly treasure she prefers 
the privilege of breathing an earnest prayer to Christ, 
of shedding tears of pious ecstasy. No more scandal, 
hypocrisy, and shameful deeds here, but repose and real 
adoration ! 

It is interesting to notice that Madame Louise's angel 
at the Monastery of St. Denis, that is to say, the nun who 
was charged with the duty of instructing her in the customs 
and duties of the Carmelites, was Sister Julie, — in the world 
Julienne de MacMahon, of the illustrious family to which 
belonged Marshal MacMahon, recently at the head of the 
French government. 

Several contemporaneous publicists have spoken rather 
lightly of the works which have been written relating to the 



Madame Louise de France. 119 

religious vocation of the royal Carmelite, — those of the 
Abbe Proyart and the Comtesse de Drohojowska, for 
instance, and the Comte de Chambord's letter to the Holy 
Father. For my own part, I confess that such productions 
are extremely touching to me. 

Is it not a pleasant thought that, not far from the 
boudoir where a Du Barry dragged the royal power in the 
dust, there was a narrow cell where a descendant of Saint 
Louis sought, by the power of prayer, to avert the wrath of 
God .f* Since debauchery has its priestesses of vice and 
degradation, purity, by way of reprisal, must have its virgins 
and heroines. Blasphemy, vile and cynical, must be met by 
prayer, ardent and exalted. To compensate for all the 
assaults upon divine majesty, virtues must exist so sublime 
and enthusiastic as to seem exaggerated, almost insane to 
profane eyes. To secure momentary oblivion of the mad- 
ness of debauchery, just men must display what Saint Paul 
called the madness of the Cross. It was for this very 
reason — that, in spite of the mass of vice, there were still 
some noble souls who preserved the treasure of jsurity in 
the sanctuary of their conscience — that the eighteenth 
century was not destroyed at one blow, and that, in the 
cataclysm of the Revolution, the women of that social body, 
which was supposed to be so corrupt and frivolous, recalled, 
by their greatness of soul, and their firmness and courage 
upon the scaffold, the strength of mind of the early 
Christians, and the saintly courage of the martyrs. Who 
can say .? It may be that if Madame Louise had not joined 



120 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

the Carmelite community, the august woman, whose first 
appearance at the palace of Versailles we are about to 
witness, would not have borne herself with such unfail- 
ing dignity before her persecutors, or have faced her 
executioners with such magnificent courage. 



V. 

THE CHILDHOOD OF MARIE-ANTOINETTE. 

ON the 2d November, 1755, the Feast of the Dead, a 
terrible earthquake engulfed the city of Lisbon. On 
the same day a child was born at Vienna, to whom Destiny 
had allotted the most tragic fate, — a princess who was, like 
the Saviour, to have her Feast of Palms and her Golgotha, 
and to experience ^11 the joy and anguish, the triumph and 
suffering, which have ever fallen to the lot of woman. 

This existence, doomed to terminate in a catastrophe 
which far exceeds in horror the most memorable instances 
of the stern decrees of fate in ancient times, opened in the 
tranquillity which is so often the precursor of an impending 
tempest. The Empress Maria Theresa, a woman of genius 
and of heart as well, was equally worthy of admiration as 
sovereign, as wife, and as mother. No less simple than 
dignified in her bearing, she needed none of the factitious 
aid of etiquette to inspire veneration. 

A few days before the birth of Marie-Antoinette, the Due 
de Tarouka laid a wager with the empress that she would 
bring an archduke into the world. When he lost his wager, 
he presented her Majesty with a model in porcelain of a 
kneeling figure, holding out to her a tablet on which were 
engraved four lines of the Italian poet Metastasio, which 



122 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

may be translated thus : " I have lost ; the royal maiden has 
forced me to pay. But if it be true that she resembles you, 
the world will be the gainer." 

Maria Theresa was careful to give her daughter instruc- 
tion in many useful matters while the latter was still quite 
young. The empress showed her daughter her own shroud, 
woven with her royal hands, and took her into the vault 
where their ancestors lay at rest. " My subjects," said the 
empress, " are now paying me the homage of which these 
who lie here were once the recipients. I shall be forgotten, 
as they have been." 

In their daily drives the empress and her husband fre- 
quently allowed the progress of their carriage to be stopped 
by more modest equipages, and would quietly take their 
place in the line. As Goethe has said, the imperial family 
were nothing but Germans of the higher middle class. 

Maria Theresa walked about the city with her daughters 
like a private individual. She used to make unceremonious 
calls upon Count Palfy and Prince Esterhazy and von Kinsky. 
Her welcome of a nobleman or an artisan, a diplomat or an 
artist, was equally gracious and engaging. She allowed little 
Marie-Antoinette to play with the child Mozart. 

The young archduchess grew to maturity under this 
tender and healthy influence. Her father, the Emperor 
Francis, seemed to be even more attached to her than to his 
other children. In 1765 he went to Innspriick, to be present 
at the marriage of the Archduke Leopold to a Spanish 
infanta. He had gone but a short distance from Schon- 



The Childhood of Marie- Antoinette. 123 

brunn on his journey when he ordered the coachman to stop. 
" Go and find the Archduchess Marie-Antoinette," said he to 
one of his suite ; " I must see her once more." The Httle 
princess came, and her father kissed her, with tears in his 
eyes. He asked God's blessing upon her ; and it was only 
by making a great effort of his will that he parted from her. 
He was never to see her again ; for a few days later he died 
suddenly of an apoplectic shock. Marie-Antoinette never 
forgot the last look which her father gave her. As he cast 
upon her that look, overflowing with affection and anxiety, 
had he a presentiment of the impending catastrophe ? 

One day Maria Theresa questioned the clairvoyant Gass- 
ner as to the future of the young princess. " Is my 
Antoinette destined to lead a happy life t " she asked him. 
Gassner turned pale, and said nothing. As he was urged by 
the empress to reply, he said reluctantly, "Madame, every 
back has its cross to bear." 

But let us have done with these gloomy thoughts of the 
future. The most brilliant destiny was apparently in store 
for the young archduchess. It was she who was to unite 
the families of Hapsburg and Bourbon ; she who was to 
be queen of France ! Maria Theresa took great pleasure in 
dreaming that fair dream. In 1766, a Parisian woman of 
influence, who had succeeded in making her sa/on famous 
throughout Europe, — Madame Geoffrin, — journeyed to 
Poland on a visit to Stanislas Poniatowski. She broke her 
journey at Vienna, where she received a welcome which 
stirred her pride. 



1 24 The Last Years of Louis X V. 

"I think I must be in a dream," she wrote, on the 12th 
June, 1766, to M. Bautin, Receiver-General; "I am better 
known here than in Rue Saint-Honore, and for the last 
fortnight my journey has made an incredible amount of talk." 
Farther on in the same letter she speaks of Marie-Antoi- 
nette : " The empress has requested me to write home to 
France that I have seen the little lady, and how beautiful 
I thought her." 

Madame Geoffrin took the princess on her knees. "Ah," 
said she, "this is a little girl I should much like to take 
away with me!" "Take her; take her," rejoined the 
empress, gayly, for she was dreaming of Versailles and 
the dauphin. From that time on, she strove to form the 
future dauphine on the model of the French court. 
Speech, literature, novels, history, fashions, plays, books, 
almanacs, pictures, — all the surroundings of the young 
archduchess were French. 

As M. Feuillet de Conches has said, in the eloquent 
preface to his Collection : " The wind from France ruffled 
the fair locks of Marie-Antoinette." She danced with 
Noverre, studied elocution with Sainville, read the tragedies 
of Racine and the fables of La Fontaine with Dufresne. 
A fashionable hairdresser, Larsonneur, was imported from 
Paris, with milliners and dressmakers, to arrange the young 
princess's wardrobe and dress her hair. Her truest adorn- 
ment, however, was the grace which Nature gave her. 

As Madame la Comtesse d'Armaille has said, in a captivat- 
ing little sketch called " Mother and Daughter," " There 



The Childhood of Marie-Antoinette. 125 

are certain women's faces whose beauty seems to strike us 
only when they are under the stimulus of some excitement ; 
others there are which accord perfectly with the freshness of 
Nature, the poetic loveliness of lonely fields. Marie-Antoi- 
nette's beauty was of the latter type. Her tall and slender 
form, her light and graceful step, recalled the heroines of 
the old German legends. Undine was not more bewitching 
when she abandoned the shelter of the waves, and lived 
among mortals for a few short days. The princess's blue 
eyes, whose limpid purity equalled that of the waters of 
the Danube, were melting and sparkling at once. Her 
rosy, smiling mouth was rendered doubly charming by the 
little dimple in her chin. Her light-brown hair, pushed 
back in the fashion of the day, exposed to view her pure 
and noble forehead, and her slender and graceful neck. 
Everything in her face and figure told of distinguished 
birth, openness of disposition, and kindness of heart." 

She was no longer a child, nor was she yet a woman. She 
had that mixture of knowledge and ignorance, of intelligence 
and innocence, which is so attractive and fascinating. 
Already a shadow of sadness flitted now and again across 
her pure and radiant features, brightened by the sweetest 
of smiles. 

" Poor women ! " said Mademoiselle Rosa Ferrucci, a young 
girl whose touching story has been told by Abbe Perreyve ; 
" we poor women are more powerless than the leaves which 
are torn from the trees and scattered abroad by the first 
breath of air ; our childhood is barely over, when our hearts. 



126 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

which can only love and endure, are torn by a thousand 
conflicting emotions, joyous and sad." 

Versailles appeared to Marie-Antoinette with the enchant- 
ment which distance lends. A French priest, Abbe de 
Vermond, who was her preceptor after 1 768, told her marvel- 
lous tales of that abode of bliss, where she was destined to 
shine with such lustre. But the thought that she must part 
from her dearest mother, from her loving family and the good 
people of Vienna, who are famous for their devoted affection 
for their sovereigns, grieved the tender heart of the princess 
in advance. To-day when sovereigns give their daughters 
in marriage, they are almost certain of seeing them again ; 
but formerly it was not so. In those days, partings were 
likely to be forever. 

We can imagine the suffering of Maria Theresa as she 
said to herself: " Soon I shall have to say farewell forever to 
my beloved daughter, of whom I am so proud. Soon I must 
give her my blessing and a mother's kiss for the last time." 
Like many another mother, the empress's heart was made 
sad by the very occurrence which she had sought with the 
utmost earnestness to bring to pass. 

The alliance, which was in strict accord with the policy 
of Austria, was determined upon. Marie-Antoinette was to 
be dauphine of France. As the moment of her daughter's 
departure approached, the emotion of the empress grew 
deeper and deeper. She took her in her arms, kissed her 
time and time again, and made her sleep in the same room 
with herself. Longing to retain the treasure she was on the 



The Childhood of Marie- Antoinette. 127 

point of losing, she would have been glad to stay the flight 
of time. Nor was Marie-Antoinette less sad and anxious 
than her mother. 

On the 23d January, 1770, she received the wedding-ring 
from the dauphin, and twenty-three years later — twenty- 
three years, day for day — But no, let us not touch yet, 
even in thought, upon the last dread catastrophe ! 

On the 1 6th April, the Marquis de Durfort went to 
the imperial palace, and in the name of the Most Christian 
King formally made the request for the archduchess's hand 
for the dauphin. On the 17th, the princess renounced her 
claim to the Austrian succession. On the i8th, ^-\& fetes 
were begun at Vienna, and they continued until the 21st, — 
the day fixed for the departure of the archduchess. 

On the 19th, she was married by proxy, the dauphin 
being represented by the Archduke Maximilian. The sign- 
ing of the imperial register took place at the palace Von 
der Burg. It was said that when Maria Theresa took the 
pen her hand trembled. 

The dauphin having expressed a wish that his fiancee 
should personally declare her assent to the marriage, Marie- 
Antoinette had written to him : " I thank you for the very 
kind expressions of which you make use ; I am very deeply 
touched and honored by them, and I appreciate my obliga- 
tions to you for such kindliness of feeling. The example 
and the teachings of my glorious and loving mother have 
inspired in me the desire to fulfil all my duties, and, with 
God's help, I hope that my earnest efforts may make me 



128 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

worthy of my destiny. You were pleased to ask that my 
own consent to your choice should accompany that of the 
empress-queen, and you must, you say, take me as a gift 
from myself. I may reply, since she permits me, that I have 
received my mother's commands with no less pleasure than 
respect. You will find in me a faithful and devoted wife, 
with no other thought than to employ such powers as I 
possess to please you and merit your affection." 

The city of Vienna was in holiday attire and in mourn- 
ing at the same time. Shouts of gladness were mingled 
with tears. Three days of seclusion, ending with the admin- 
istration of the sacrament, were followed by a visit to the 
tomb of the emperors. The archduchess knelt, and invoked 
the blessing of her ancestors. 

At last she must depart; the 21st April has arrived. 
Farewell to the patriarchal residence, the palace Von der 
Burg ! Farewell to the shady walks of Schbnbrunn ! Fare- 
well to the blue and limpid lakes of Laxenbourg ! Farewell, 
ye good people of Vienna, who weep for the young exile ! 
Ah, be she peasant or empress, the mother who for the last 
time looks upon the face and hears the voice of her daughter 
follows her every movement with her eyes, and intrusts her 
to the hand of Providence ; and then, seeking her in vain, 
enters her lonely chamber, closes the door, and falls upon 
her knees in an agony of grief ! The mother who has 
known the anguish and heartrending torture of separation 
will understand what took place in the heart of Maria 
Theresa. 



The Childhood of Marie- Antoinette. 129 

The departure of Marie-Antoinette reminds me of a 

chanson once on everybody's lips, but forgotten long ago, 

the distant echo of which moves me almost to tears at this 

moment, doubtless because my mother used to sing it to 

me in my childhood : — 

" Ici commence ton voyage. 
Si tu n'allais pas revenir ! 
Ta pauvre m^re est sans courage 
Pour te quitter, pour te benir. 
Travaille bien, fais ta priere : 
La priere donne du cceur, 
Et quelquefois pense a ta mere, 
Cela te portera bonheur. 

Adieu, ma fille, adieu ! 

A la grace de Dieu ! 

" Elle s'en va, douce exilee, 
Gagner son pain, sous d'autres cieux. 
Longtemps encor, dans la vallee, 
Sa mere la suivit des yeux. 
Puis, lorsque sa douleur amere 
N'eut plus sa fille pour temoin, 
Elle pleura, la pauvre mere, 
L'enfant qui lui disait de loin: 

Adieu, ma mere, adieu ! 

A la grace de Dieu ! " * 

* " Here thy journey begins. Oh, if thou shouldst never return ! Thy 
poor mother has no courage to take leave of thee or to give thee her blessing. 
Labor faithfully, and pray ; for prayer gives strength. And think sometimes of thy 
mother, — that will bring thee good luck. Adieu, my daughter, adieu ! May 
God's blessing go with thee ! 

" She has gone, dear exiled one, to earn her bread under other skies. Still 
for a long time her mother's eyes follow her through the valley; but when her 
bitter grief can be indulged without her daughter witnessing it, she weeps, poor 
mother, for her separation from the child who called back to her from afar: 
Adieu, dear mother, adieu ! May God's blessing stay with thee! " 



130 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

Weber says in his Memoirs : " It is hard to disbelieve in 
presentiments, when one has witnessed such leave-takings 
as those between Marie-Antoinette and her family, her 
servants, and her country. Men and women abandoned 
themselves to their grief, nor did any one return to his 
house until the last courier who attended her was lost to 
sight ; and then they went home only to lament with their 
families the loss that was felt by all alike." 

The die was cast ! Leaving home and friends, never 
more to return, the maiden of fourteen years was already 
under the fatal spell which was impelling her towards the 
abyss. 




tLhoio-tjnai.Hinc &^yupiJ S^ C"" 



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VI. 

MARIE-ANTOINETTE'S ARRIVAL IN FRANCE, 

AS Maria Theresa pressed Marie-Antoinette to her heart 
for the last time, she handed her a paper of great 
value, which contained most judicious advice. This master- 
piece of maternal solicitude, written by the empress with 
her own hand, was entitled, " Rules to be read every 
month." It began thus : " On this 21st April, the day of our 
parting. When you awake, you will say your morning 
prayers on your knees as soon as you leave your bed ; and 
read some good book for a little while, even if it is not more 
than fifteen minutes, without attending to anything else, or 
speaking to anybody. Everything depends upon beginning 
the day well, and upon the spirit in which it is begun, 
which may make even the most trifling actions creditable 
and praiseworthy." 

Maria Theresa went on to enter into all the details of a 
pious existence. " I do not know," said she, " whether the 
custom of ringing the Angelus obtains in France; but do 
you devote a few moments to meditation at that hour : in 
your heart, at least, if not in public. If your confessor 
approves, you will receive communion every six weeks, also 
on the great feasts of the Church, and particularly the feast 



132 The Last Years of Lotiis XV. 

of the Holy Virgin : on those days, or the day before, do not 
forget the especial veneration of your family for the Holy 
Virgin, with whose particular protection it has at all times 
been honored. Do not read any book, however harmless it 
may seem, without first asking your confessor's approval. 
This point is so much the more essential to observe in 
France, because books are continually being published 
there which teem with grace and learning, but which con- 
tain, under cover of these attractive elements, many things 
most harmful from a moral and religious standpoint. I 
implore you, therefore, my daughter, to read no book what- 
soever, not even a pamphlet, without consulting your 
confessor. I ask of you, my dearest, this most striking 
proof of your affection and your regard for the advice of a 
loving mother who has no desire except for your welfare and 
happiness." 

These rules, to be read every month, were brought to a 
close with these simple and touching words : " Never fail to 
remember the anniversary of your dear father's death, nor of 
mine when it comes to pass. Meanwhile, you can take my 
birthday as a day on which to pray for me." 

The youthful bride began her journey to France. The 
heavens were resplendent with the rays of a joyous spring- 
time sun. 

" All Nature smiled upon this new Iphigenia, who directed 
her steps with the same proud confidence towards Hymen 
and the sword. O merciful God ! why didst thou not 
interrupt that royal progress, that triumphant progress of 



Marie-Antoinettes Arrival in France. 133 

grandeur and youth and beauty? Why didst thou not 
rescue the royal child from the heartrending fate which 
awaited her ? Ah, how happy would have been her death 
then, in comparison with that which was in store for her 
at the hands of infamous murderers ! Austria would have 
received with pious emotion the mortal remains of the 
daughter of the Hapsburgs. The prayers of a Christian 
mother would have accompanied her spotless soul to its ever- 
lasting home, and France, afflicted by the unforeseen blow, 
would also have mourned for the sweet young princess, and 
for the hopes blighted by her untimely death." * 

On the 6th May, 1770, Marie-Antoinette arrived at 
Schutteren, the last German village before Kehl and the 
bridge across the Rhine. There she saw the soil of France 
for the first time. She heard the music of the waters of the 
Rhine, the poetic and majestic stream so often, alas ! turbu- 
lent and colored with blood, — the stream which now flows 
between two German banks, but which then bathed the soil 
of France upon one shore. 

On the He du Rhin had been built a pavilion called the 
" Pavilion de I'Echange." It contained a large hall, with 
a smaller apartment on each side : one for the ladies and 
s;entlemen of the Viennese court to whom had been 
intrusted the duty of accompanying the princess to the 
threshold of her adopted country ; the other for her French 
suite, — her maid of honor, the Comtesse de Noailles, her 
dame d'atours, the Duchesse de Cosse ; four ladies in wait- 

* Madame la Comtesse d'Armailld, La Mere et la Fille. 



134 '^^^ Last Years of Louis XV. 

ing; the Comte de Saulx-Tavannes, knight of honor, 
Comte de Tesse, first equerry, the Bishop of Chartres, first 
chaplain, with the other officers and equerries and her 
body-guards. 

There took place the symbolical ceremony of delivering 
the bride to her new countrymen. The pavilion was adorned 
with tapestries, of which an unfortunate selection had been 
made. " The subject," says Goethe, then a student at the 
University of Strasbourg, "was nothing less than the story of 
Jason, Medea, and Croesus. At the left of the throne was 
seen the ill-fated bride, in the throes of the most cruel of 
deaths ; on the right, Jason, in a delirium of grief, was be- 
wailing the loss of his children, who lay dead at his feet ; 
while the Fury who slew them was making her escape upon 
her chariot with its team of dragons." 

As he viewed the preparations, the future author of " Faust" 
cried, " In Heaven's name, can it be that the most frightful 
instance of hymeneal misery is to be thus inconsiderately 
forced upon a young princess at her first coming into her 
new estates } Is there no one among the French artists and 
decorators who realizes that a picture is like an acted play 
in its effect upon the senses and the soul, and that it often 
arouses presentiments of evil } " 

When Marie- Antoinette entered the Pavilion de I'Echange, 
it was dark and threatening. A heavy black cloud obscured 
the view of the Strasbourg side of the river, and moved 
slowly towards the island. The three commissioners 
appointed by the king were awaiting her in the centre 



Marie- Antoinettes Arrival in France. 135 

of the hall. About noon, the door on the Austrian side 
opened, and the dauphine was seen in the doorway. She 
walked to the platform in the centre, and listened to the 
reading of the commissioners' powers and the act of 
delivery. These formalities at an end, the members of her 
Austrian suite passed before the former archduchess for 
the last time, kissed her hand, and returned to the Austrian 
salon, the door of which was closed behind them. 

The dauphine then changed her garments throughout. 
" When she had been entirely re-apparelled, so that she 
retained no single article coming from a foreign court, not 
even her stockings (such was the invariable custom on such 
occasions), the doors opened, and the young princess, fixing 
her eyes upon the Comtesse de Noailles, threw herself into 
her arms, and begged her, with tears in her eyes, and with 
heartfelt earnestness, to lead and advise her, to be in every- 
thing her guide and her staff. One could but admire this 
fascinating proceeding : with a single smile she won all 
hearts, and in this enchanting personahty, instinct with 
animation truly French, a certain august serenity, aided, it 
may be, by the majestic pose of her head upon her shoulders, 
recalled the daughter of the Ceesars." * 

The ceremony of the exchange was finished. Upon 
reaching the French shore of the Rhine, the dauphine 
entered one of the king's carriages, and drove to Stras- 
bourg. The storm which had been threatening for some 
hours broke at last. The Pavilion de I'Echange was sub- 

* Memoires de Madame Campan. 



136 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

merged beneath a pouring rain, and the shouts of the 
crowd were mingled with the roaring of the thunder. 

On the next day, May 8th, Marie-Antoinette repaired to 
the Cathedral of Strasbourg. Before the great door stood 
a young prelate clad in a golden chasuble, cross in hand, 
and mitre on his head, Prince Louis de Rohan. 

" Madame," said he, " two nations met together in this 
temple eagerly return thanks to the God of Empires, who 
by these solemn and welcome nuptials puts the seal to 
their mutual happiness, and cements an alliance whose pur- 
pose has ever been to protect religion, and promote peace. 
You see that Alsace is overflowing with joy, and France 
awaits in your person the fulfilment of her dearest wish. In 
the outburst of gladness which will be visible on every side, 
recognize, Madame, the same emotion which caused tears to 
flow at Vienna, and which leaves in the hearts of those who 
must be sundered from you, the most heartfelt and affec- 
tionate regret. Thus is the Archduchess Antoinette known 
already, even in a land where she has never been seen. Such 
celebrity is oftentimes the result of high birth alone; but 
in your case, Madame, it is the rightful meed of your virtue 
and your grace ; above all, it is the result of your reputation 
as the possessor of those natural, kindly qualities which the 
loving care of an ever-illustrious mother has fostered and 
made perfect in you. In our eyes you will be the hving 
image of the revered empress, who has long been the 
admiration of all Europe, as she will be of the generations to 
come. The soul of Maria Theresa is to be linked with the 



Marie- Antoinette s Arrival in France. 137 

soul of the Bourbons. Of a union so much to be desired, 
an age of gold should be born ; and our nephews, who live 
under the happy empire of Antoinette and Louis-Auguste, 
will witness the perpetuation of the happiness which we 
enjoy under the sway of Louis the Well-Beloved." 

The man who uttered these words was the future Cardinal 
de Rohan, the unhappy hero of the affair of the necklace. 

Paris, Versailles, all France, indeed, were in a state of 
excitement. Nothing was talked about but the expected 
arrival of the dauphine. Decorators went from town to 
town, preparing apartments for her in advance. Sixty new 
travelling carriages awaited her at Strasbourg. 

At Paris the shops of the court tailors were thronged by 
those who came to stare at the garments made for the fetes 
that were to celebrate her arrival. People spoke of a display 
of fireworks, the centre-piece of which, composed of thirty 
thousand rockets, would cost, so they said, four thousand 
louis (nearly fifty thousand of our francs). 

The dauphine continued her journey. Along the route 
the towns were given over to merry-making, and the whole 
country-side was in holiday attire. The ground was covered 
with a carpet of flowers. Young girls, clothed in white, 
offered bouquets to Marie-Antoinette. The bells rang at 
random. On every side arose hearty shouts of " Vive la 
Dauphine ! " " Vive le Dauphin ! " The roads were well- 
nigh blocked by the multitude of spectators : the blinds of 
the princess's carriage were raised, so that everybody could 
gaze at his leisure upon her sweet and lovely face, and her 



138 The Last Years of Lords XV. 

fascinating smile. The young peasants said to one another, 
" How pretty our dauphine is ! " A lady who was in the 
carriage called her attention to that flattering remark, and 
the dauphine replied, " Madame, the French look upon me 
with very indulgent eyes." 

Official speeches followed fast, one close upon another. It 
was a succession of dithyrambs in honor of the young 
princess. One orator essayed to address her in German. 
" Monsieur," said she, " from this day forth, I understand no 
language but French." 

At Nancy she paid a visit of pious respect to the tombs 
of the Lorraine princes, her father's ancestors. At Rheims, 
she said, thinking of the future ceremony of consecration, 
" This is a city which I desire not to see again for a very 
long time." 

A few leagues from Compiegne she met the Due de 
Choiseul, who welcomed her as a devoted friend of her 
family. It was the 14th May, 1770. A moment later, in 
the forest of Compiegne, at the cross-road of the Pont-de- 
Berne, the king and the dauphin appeared, attended by a 
large escort. Marie-Antoinette at once left her carriage, 
and threw herself upon the turf at the feet of Louis XV., 
who quickly raised her to her feet and kissed her. The 
dauphin, more bashful than herself, hardly dared to look 
at her; as the official report had it, "he saluted her on 
the cheek." 

The next day they left Compiegne for Versailles. On 
their way through St. Denis, Marie-Antoinette expressed a 



Marie- Antoinette s Arrival in France. 139 

desire to see her aunt, Madame Louise, novice at the Car- 
melite convent. She entered the gates with the king at six 
in the evening on the 15th May. One of tlie nuns speaks 
of this visit in a letter now among the manuscripts in the 
Bibliotheque Nationale : " The king requested me to call the 
sisters, and introduce them to Madame la Dauphine. She 
is, reverend mother, a princess of unexceptionable features, 
figure, and manners ; and, what is infinitely better, she is 
said to be of an eminently pious turn. Her features are 
majestic, modest, and sweet. The king, Mesdames, and 
Monseigneur le Dauphin more than all, seem enchanted 
with her ; they vie with one another in pronouncing her 
incomparable." 

Along the whole of the route the crowd was innumer- 
able. The air rang with enthusiastic acclamations. Marie- 
Antoinette had the tact to attribute all the honor of the 
ovation to Louis XV. " The French," said she, " never see 
enough of their king ; they cannot treat me with more 
grateful kindness than by thus demonstrating to me their 
love for him whom I have already come to look upon as a 
second father." 

The night of the 15th May, Marie-Antoinette lay at the 
chateau of La Muette, where the king gave her, with other 
jewels, the celebrated pearl necklace, of unexampled beauty, 
which was brought to France by Anne of Austria, and by 
her handed down for the queens and dauphines of France. 
On the following day she arrived at Versailles. She could 
not look unmoved upon that celebrated palace, which was 



140 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

then playing so great a part in France and in Europe, and 
of which she had heard so much. At ten in the morning 
she crossed the threshold of the palace and entered the 
marble court, where she was welcomed by the king and 
the dauphin. 




Ujhoto^naA>urc ^ituptiS^C? 



Printed "byGOUPlL&C? of PARIS, for ttc CLUB OF OLD VOLUMES, 



VII. 

THE MARRIAGE OF MARIE-ANTOINETTE, AND THE 
FETES ATTENDING IT. 

WE have seen the dauphine's arrival at the palace of 
Versailles. It was the i6th May, 1770, and ten 
o'clock in the morning. But a few moments, and the nuptial 
benediction will be pronounced upon the young husband 
and wife. With eager but respectful curiosity all eyes were 
turned upon the princess, who was in travelling costume. 
Soon she will reappear in her superb wedding-gown. 

Her portrait is thus drawn by Bachaumont : " She is very 
well shaped, and her figure is finely proportioned through- 
out. Her hair is light and of a beautiful shade ; I should 
judge that it will some day be a light chestnut. Her fore- 
head is fine ; her face is a graceful oval in shape, a little 
too long ; her eyebrows are as full as a blonde can ever boast. 
Her eyes are blue, but not by any means dull ; they sparkle 
with animation and intelligence. She has an aquiline nose, 
tapering slightly at the end ; her mouth is very small, and 
her lips are rather thick, especially the lower, which has 
the peculiar formation characteristic of the ' Austrian lija.' 
Her complexion is of dazzling whiteness, and her natural 
coloring enables her to dispense with artificial aids. Her 
bearing is suitable to an archduchess, but her dignity is 



142 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

tempered by her gentleness. Gazing upon this princess, it is 
hard not to avoid a feeling of respect mingled with affection." 

At one in the afternoon, the dauphine, in magnificent 
attire, and followed by an imposing procession, accompanied 
the dauphin to the chapel. Monseigneur de La Roche- 
Aymon, Archbishop of Rheims and Grand Chaplain of 
France, was the officiating clergyman. The bride and 
groom advanced to the altar, and there knelt down. The 
chapel, decked with wreaths and flowers, was resplendent 
with thousands of lights. 

The archbishop blessed thirteen pieces of gold and a 
golden ring, and handed them to the dauphin, who placed 
the ring on the fourth finger of the dauphine's left hand, 
after which he gave her the thirteen pieces. After the Pater, 
the canopy was held by the Bishop of Senlis on the prince's 
side, and by the Bishop of Chartres on that of the princess. 
The newly wedded, with deep emotion mutually pledged to 
one another an attachment which even death itself had no 
power to interrupt. 

All Paris had come to Versailles at this time. The 
people had been arriving on foot since dawn. The bourgeois 
had come too, some upon hired horses, others in cabs or 
hired carriages. The park was filled to its utmost limit with 
an enormous multitude. 

Alas, gloomy presentiments are fated to recur too soon ! 
At three in the afternoon, the sky became covered with 
clouds, and a torrent of rain fell. Loud roared the thunder. 
Every one ran for the nearest shelter; it was a general 



The Marriage of Marie- Antoinette. 143 

sauve-qui-peut. The weather was so inclement that the 
fireworks had to be abandoned. The illuminations were 
fairly drowned out by the rain, and the streets and squares 
of Versailles were like a desert. 

But although the approaches to the palace in the evening 
were unattractive enough, the interior was a blaze of cheer- 
fulness and light. All the magnificence of a wealthy 
aristocracy, all the resources of luxury and art, were there 
accumulated. There was a game of lansquenet in the Ga- 
lerie des Glaces, and a state sujaper was served in the apart- 
ment known as the queen's antechamber.* 

On the following day, the 17th May, the new theatre, 
begun in 1753, after designs of the architect Gabriel, was 
opened for the first time. (It is the hall where the Senate 
now holds its sessions.) The play was the opera " Persee," 
the words by Quinault, the music by Lulli. On the 19th 
May, a grand full-dress ball took place in this new hall, 
and was opened by the dauphin and the dauphine. 

Madame du Deffand wrote to Horace Walpole on the 
morning of that day: " There are all sorts of entanglements 
here ; the minuet to be performed by Mademoiselle de 
Lorraine this evening has caused lots of trouble." 

In truth, this affair of the minuet was of vital importance, 
and the whole court was stirred to its depths. And what 
was it all about ? Louis XV., to flatter the Empress Maria 
Theresa, had decreed that Mademoiselle de Lorraine, by 
virtue of her kinship to the dauphine, should dance the 

* No. 117 of M. Soulie's Notice du Musee de Versailles. 



144 '^^^^ Z^j-/ Years of Lottis XV. 

minuet immediately after the princes and princesses of the 
royal family. We can see that this tended to establish an 
intermediate caste between the princes of the blood and 
the great nobles, in favor of the Lorraine family. 

Thereupon arose a tempest of jealousy and wrath. The 
dukes got together, and convoked an assemblage of the 
leading nobles at the house of the Bishop of Noyon, brother 
of the Marechal de Broglie. There they drew up a gran- 
diloquent memorial to the king, in which they said: — 

" Sire, the grandees and nobility of the kingdom lay at the 
foot of the throne, with perfect confidence, the just alarm which 
they have felt because of the current rumors that your Majesty 
has been solicited to accord to the family of Lorraine a rank 
immediately after the princes of the blood, and that it has been 
ordered that Mademoiselle de Lorraine should dance before all 
the ladies of the court, at the full-dress ball to be given in honor 
of the marriage of Monsieur le Dauphin. They are of opinion. 
Sire, they would fail in the duty which their birth enjoins upon 
them if they should not lay before you how greatly such a 
distinction, as humiliating for them as it is novel, would add to 
their grief at losing the privilege which has always been theirs, of 
being separated from your Majesty and the royal family by no 
intermediate rank. 

" The grandeur of the highest dignitaries in every state marks 
the grandeur of the nation, and the grandeur of the nation is the 
source of the grandeur of its king. It would be equivalent to 
casting a doubt upon the pre-eminence of France in Europe to 
doubt the pre-eminence of those who, in the words of one of 
your ancestors, ' are a part of its honor and of the honor of its 
kings.' " 

And all this for a minuet! The public at large was 



The Marriage of Marie- Antoinette. 145 

much diverted by the presentation of this request by a 
bishop. Observing among the signers the names of those 
whose dignities were of recent manufacture side by side 
with those of the most ancient origin, the remark was made 
that the descendants of such and such a one might some 
day proudly say : " One of our ancestors signed the famous 
request concerning the minuet at the time of the marriage 
of Louis XV.'s grandson ; and for that reason our name was 
thenceforth reckoned among those which shed the brightest 
lustre upon the monarchy." 

The request was parodied in these lines: — 

"Sire, les grands de vos Etats 
Verront avec beaucoup de peine 
Une princesse de Lorraine 
Sur eux au bal prendre le pas. 
Si Votre Majeste projette 
De les fletrir d'un tel affront, 
lis quitteront le cadenette, 
Et laisseront la des violons. 
Avisez-y, la ligue est faite. 
Signe : I'eveque de Noyon, 
La Veaupaliere, Beaufremont, 
Clermont, Laval et de Villette." * 

Behold a new Fronde, a veritable insurrection ! Louis 
XV. replied to the request by the following note : — 

" The ambassador of the empress-queen and the emperor 
requested me, on the part of his sovereigns, to confer some dis- 

* " Sire, the nobles of your realm will be deeply grieved to see a princess 
of Lorraine take precedence of tliem at the ball. If your Majesty proposes to 
ofier them such an insult, they will wash their hands of the whole affair, violins 
and all. Take notice ; the agreement is made. Signed : Bishop of Noyon, La 
Veaupaliere," etc. 

10 



146 The Last Years of Lotus XV. 

tinction upon Mademoiselle de Lorraine, on the present occasion of 
the marriage of my grandson to the Archduchess Marie-Antoinette. 
The order of dancing at the ball being the only matter which could 
not be turned into a precedent, since the choice of dancers depends 
solely upon my will, without distinction of place, rank, or dignity 
(excepting always the princes and princesses of my blood, who are 
not to be compared or placed upon the same level with any other 
Frenchman) ; and, moreover, desiring to make no innovation upon 
the customs in vogue at my court, — I assume that the grandees 
and nobles of my kingdom, in view of the fidelity, submission, and 
attachment which they have always shown to me and my prede- 
cessors, will never give me occasion to be displeased with them, 
especially in this matter, in which my only purpose is to show my 
gratitude to the empress for the gift she has made me, which you 
and I both hope will secure the happiness of my declining years." 

However, in order to enforce obedience, the king was 
almost compelled to resort to threats. The ball took place 
at last, and Mademoiselle Lorraine triumphantly walked the 
minuet which had caused so much heart-burning. 

The same evening there was a display of fireworks upon 
the terrace of the palace. After it was at an end, all the 
paraphernalia were removed, to make room for an illumina- 
tion of the park, which reached its climax, at the extremity 
of the great canal, by a magnificent affair representing the 
Temple of the Sun. The canal was filled with gayly 
bedecked boats, and the great fountains sparkled in the 
many colored light. 

Stages for jugglers' performances were erected in the 
park, and the light-hearted populace danced to their hearts' 
content in the half-lighted shade of the arbors. 



The Marriage of Marie-Antoinette. 147 

On the 2ist of May, there was a bal masque in the 
king's apartments, and on the 23d a performance of 
"Athalie" with choral music. 

Now it was the turn of the good city of Paris to cele- 
brate the dauphin's nuptials by one of those fetes of 
bewildering beauty of which she alone has the secret. It 
was appointed to take place on the 30th May. 

The population of Paris was increased by a number- 
less multitude of foreigners and provincials. The locality 
selected for the fete was the Place Louis XV. Prodigious 
effects were promised in pyrotechny, to be followed by an 
illumination of the Boulevards. The Place Louis XV. was 
connected with the Tuileries by a bridge, which was put 
in place every morning, and taken up every night. Between, 
were several sunken gardens. 

At eight in the evening crowds of sight-seers overflowed 
from the Place Louis XV. into Rue Royale and other 
neighboring streets. Four hundred thousand persons were 
moving about in the blaze of lanterns and torches. The 
weather was superb, and the rays of the moon and stars 
rivalled the illuminations. The equestrian statue of the 
king was in a blaze of light. The pyrotechnical display 
took place according to expectation, the principal piece 
being a representation of the Temple of Hymen. Sur- 
rounded by a sort of parapet, at the four corners of which 
were dolphins vomiting flame from their wide-open jaws, 
the many colored temple had the statue of Louis XV. for a 
background. Near the statue, and on the bank of the Seine, 



148 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

was the platform from which the rockets ascended in bril- 
liant sheaves of fire. Shouts of applause arose on all sides, 
and the crowd shrieked its delight. 

Suddenly a stray rocket fell upon the wooden stand of 
one of the illuminating lamps, and a brisk conflagration was 
started. At the same time a procession of sight-seers, 
returning to the Boulevard by Rue Royale, met a similar 
column on its way to the Place Louis XV. The two bodies 
blocked the passage, and the arrival of the firemen added 
to the confusion, which soon became something beyond 
description. The moats of the Tuileries and the sunken 
gardens were so many precipices which swallowed up many 
victims. The terror was increased a thousandfold by the 
shrieks of the wounded. There seemed to be none but dead 
and dying. All was horror and despair in that accursed 
place, destined to be the scene of so many crimes before 
the century should close. At the height of the confusion, 
a carriage coming from the Cours-la-Reine turned into the 
Champs-Elysees. Within was a youthful figure, whose 
beautiful face and charming manner adorned her even more 
than the precious gems which sparkled in her hair and upon 
her dress. It was the dauphine, paying her first visit to 
Paris, to see the illuminations of that ill-omened Place 
Louis XV. " To-day," she said to herself, " there is no storm 
impending; the sky is clear and serene, and all hearts are 
beating joyfully." She was overjoyed to see under such 
favorable auspices the fair and famous city of Paris. 

But what is this she hears } Are these shouts of joy, or 



The Marriage of Marie- Antoinette. 149 

shrieks of terror? The carriage stops. The dauphine asks 
what has happened, and is told that blood is flowing in 
streams through Place Louis XV., that the number of those 
killed is not yet known, but is surely large, and that she 
must abandon the thought of penetrating farther into the 
cruelly bereaved city. 

The carriage returns upon its tracks. Marie-Antoinette, 
deeply shocked, regains Versailles, while the dead are being 
taken to the cemetery of the Madeleine, where, some years 
hence, other victims will be laid by their side. 

Thus ended the nuptial fetes of the martyred king and 
queen. Such was the prologue to the tragedy which will 
bring tears of compassion to the eyes of generations yet 
unborn. Such were the first mutterings of the most terrible 
of tempests. 



VIII. 

THE DAUPHINE AND THE ROYAL FAMILY IN 1770. 

THE depressing effect of the catastrophe in Place 
Louis XV. was soon effaced. It was not long before 
people ceased to talk of it, except to praise the sympathetic 
natures of the young bridal couple, who had devoted their 
income for a whole year to the relief of the stricken families 
of the victims. Marie-Antoinette was the object of an 
admiration which was almost delirious in its enthusiasm. 
France was literally mad over this fifteen-year-old dauphine, 
upon whom the whole vocabulary of praise and encomium 
was exhausted. They compared her to an angel of comfort, 
to a bright torch of hope, to a morning star. It was lyricism 
run wild, an endless succession of mythological comparisons 
with the Venus de Medicis, the Atalanta at Marly, Flora, 
goddess of gardens, Hebe, radiant image of youth, and 
Juno, queen of Olympus. 

All France knelt before her. When she made her formal 
entry into Paris, her carriage was lost to sight beneath a 
shower of roses. Prostrate before the altar at Notre Dame, 
the princess seemed a being from another world, the very 
personification of goodness and purity, of poetry and prayer. 
As she appeared upon the balcony at the Tuileries, there 
was a spontaneous outburst of joyous shouts. 



The Daiiphine and the Royal Family in 1770. 151 

" Mon Dieu, what a crowd ! " she cried. 

" Madame," rejoined the Due de Brissac, " with deference 
to M. le Dauphin, every man of those who are gazing at 
you is in love with you." 

Human nature certainly has some strange peculiarities. 
This woman who was so flattered, so charming, and so much 
the fashion ; this woman who turned the head of everybody 
else, — found her husband quite lacking in the prevailing 
enthusiasm. 

The dauphin was then sixteen. He not only was not in 
delicate health, but was unusually robust. He loved fresh 
air and exercise, took delight in manual labor, fenced like a 
master, and hunted like Nimrod. And yet he was, physi- 
cally, absolutely cold. The inconceivable dislike of Louis 
Xni. for the charming Anne of Austria forms the subject 
of an interesting work by M. Armand Baschet, " Le Roi 
chez la Reine." The extraordinary coolness of the future 
Louis XVL towards his spouse might well be investigated 
similarly. The elements may be found in a collection which 
we shall have frequent occasion to cite, a collection of 
unquestionable authenticity and of great historical value, 
which throws a searching light upon Marie-Antoinette.* 

It was Comte de Mercy-Argenteau, Maria Theresa's am- 
bassador at the Court of Versailles, the model diplomatist, 
the shrewd and sagacious observer, who sent the empress 

* Secret correspondence between Maria Theresa and the Comte de Mercy- 
Argenteau, with the letters of Marie-Antoinette and Maria Theresa ; published 
by MM. d'Arneth and Geffroy. 3 vols. Firmin Didot. 



152 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

the most concise and accurate reports concerning the 
dauphine and her young husband. This witness it was 
whose mission made it his interest to know everything, and 
who was at liberty to say what he thought, who counted 
every pulsation of the princess's heart. 

The dauphin found his wife much to his liking, upon 
the condition that they should not be compelled to live as 
husband and wife. The Comte de Mercy wrote to Maria 
Theresa, Aug. 20, 1770: " Nature, somewhat backward in the 
case of M. le Dauphin, is not yet active in him, — probably 
because his physical strength has been somewhat impaired 
by his sudden growth. Moreover, there is nothing in his 
constitution to imply that he will not become healthy and 
strong, if he uses a little moderation in his over-violent 
exercises, which may do him much injury. He thinks 
Madame I'Archiduchesse charming. He is much pleased 
with her, and shows a desire to oblige and a gentleness in 
his treatment of her of which he was not believed to be 
capable. Madame la Dauphine rules him in all small mat- 
ters without the least demur from him ; and so it only needs 
a little patience, and everything will come out all right. But 
in this country they are always in a hurry about everything, 
and the king and Mesdames are continually making remarks 
which have no effect, except to cause Madame la Dauphine 
pain and anxiety." 

October 20th of the same year, the Comte de Mercy 
recurred to this delicate subject in another letter. " The 
king," he wrote, "has found fault with M. le Dauphin for 



The Dauphine and the Royal Family in 1770. 153 

his continued coolness, and catechized him about it. The 
young man replied that he thought Madame I'Archiduchesse 
charming, and loved her dearly, but that he must have 
some time yet to overcome his bashfulness.'' 

In the month of September, 1770, it was believed that 
the prince had at last made up his mind. The Comte de 
Mercy wrote in the letter of the 20th of October, before 
cited, that the dauphin had promised his wife to go with 
her to Fontainebleau to pass the night. Much delighted at 
this promise, the dauphine could not make haste enough to 
confide it to her aunts and the Comtesse de Narbonne. 
" Madame Adelaide," continues the ambassador, " chose to 
add to the effect of the dauphine's indiscretion by preaching 
to M. le Dauphin ; and he was so put out that he delib- 
erately broke his word to Madame la Dauphine. As I can 
see plainly that as long as she indulges in such confidences, 
they will simply result in keeping M. le Dauphin at a dis- 
tance, and although I hardly knew how to mention such a 
delicate matter to Madame la Dauphine, I saw that I must 
do my duty, and I thought I would say to her Royal High- 
ness that she had caused me great anxiety because of the 
rumors current at Paris that she was on bad terms with M. 
le Dauphin ; that the report had its origin in an alleged 
breach of his word by M. le Dauphin, after he had promised 
to pass a certain night in her apartments, — whence it was 
inferred that there was serious trouble between them. Her 
Royal Highness seemed somewhat embarrassed at my out- 
spokenness. But, without avoiding the subject, she replied 



154 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

thus : ' All that you have said to me has only too solid 
a basis of truth, and proves my imprudence in making 
Madame de Narbonne my confidante in this matter. But 
how was I to suppose that there could be persons so gar- 
rulous and indiscreet as to publish such things ? ' 

" I impressed upon her that everything which concerns 
the marriage relation is a sacred secret, the violation of 
which can on no pretext be excused ; in fact, that a single 
indiscretion in that regard might easily destroy forever all 
confidence between husband and wife, and produce a most 
injurious effect upon public opinion; that especially was 
it true in this case, considering the shyness and reserve of 
M. le Dauphin, for he might remain sundered from her for 
a long while, if he had reason to fear that what took place 
between them would be talked about." 

The prince was upright, honorable, and worthy of respect ; 
his piety, his charity, his estimable qualities of heart and 
mind, his love for the loeople, his humane and Christian 
sentiments, were passports to the regard of all ; but his 
exterior, it must be confessed, was not attractive. There 
was a heaviness about his gait, and a lack of decision in his 
expression ; his manners were somewhat rough, his voice 
was harsh, and his whole action heavy and torpid. One 
might have said that he was always afraid of being beguiled 
or deceived. He was continually on the defensive, and 
embarrassed, notwithstanding his commanding rank, lacking 
self-confidence, despite the adulation of his flatterers, and 
being sometimes considered proud from very excess of 



The Dauphine and the Royal Family in 1 7 70. 155 

shyness. His two brothers were utterly unlike him. The 
Comte de Provence and the Comte d'Artois were as self- 
confident as he was bashful and retiring. The former, Louis 
XVIII. that was to be, was a bel esprit, a great admirer of 
Horace, with apt quotations always at his tongue's end, 
clever, bright, and politic, remarkable for tact beyond his 
years, and for skilfully concealed ambition. The latter, the 
future Charles X., was a young man, a frolicsome child rather, 
bright, full of life and spirits, already proclaiming that he 
should love women and horses and pleasure to distraction. 

The two sisters of these three brothers, Madame Clotilde 
(afterwards Queen of Sardinia) and Madame Elisabeth, the 
martyred saint, were, when Marie-Antoinette arrived in 
France, two sweet, lovable children, to whom the young 
dauphine became sincerely attached. 

She also displayed a very real attachment for Louis XV., 
who on his part showed much sympathetic regard for her. 
When his eyes fell upon the fascinating princess, as admired 
as she was worthy of admiration, the old king had a feeling 
of satisfaction like that which Louis XIV. had when he wel- 
comed the Duchesse de Bourgogne to Versailles. The lovely 
daughter of the German Caesars brought new life and activity 
to the vast apartments of the queen, which had been un- 
occupied since the death of Marie Leczinska. The bed- 
chamber which had been occupied successively by the wife 
of Louis XIV., the Dauphine de Baviere, the Duchesse de 
Bourgogne, and the wife of Louis XV., was alloted to her. * 

* Salle No. 115 of the "Notice du Musde." 



156 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

She rose between nine and ten, dressed, and said her prayers, 
then breakfasted, and went to call upon her aunts, with whom 
she generally found the king. A little before noon the formal 
entrees took place. The dauphine applied her rouge, and 
washed her hands before everybody. At noon she attended 
mass in the chapel, after which she dined in public with the 
dauphin, in the room called the queen's antechamber.* 

" The ushers," says Madame Campan, " allowed all those 
who were suitably dressed to enter. This spectacle was the 
everlasting delight of provincial visitors. At the dinner-hour 
the stairways were thronged with well-dressed people, who, 
after watching the dauphine eat her soup, went to see the 
princes eat their boiled meat, and then ran at the top of their 
speed to be in time to see Mesdames at dessert." 

The dinner ended at half after one. The dauphine then 
went to the apartments of the dauphin, which were below 
her own ; then returned to her room, and did needle-work, 
read or wrote, or took lessons in literature or upon the harp- 
sichord. A drive in the park and the neighborhood, a visit 
or two to Mesdames, card-playing from seven to nine, then 
supper, and at eleven to bed. Such was the daily life of the 
princess. Her principal associates were her aunts, Mes- 
dames Adelaide, Victoire, and Sophie, whose ages in 1770 
were thirty-eight, thirty-seven, and thirty-six years respec- 
tively. All three had remained unmarried. Notwithstanding 
their unexceptionable morals, they had their failings. Ma- 
dame Adelaide liked to have a finger in every pie. She 

* No. 117 of the " Notice du Musde." 



\ 



The Dauphine and the Ro^al Family in 1770. 157 

thought that she had much influence with her father, and 
the ministers were obliged to reckon with her. Madame 
Victoire followed in general the directions of her elder 
sister, although she did not lack an active intellect her- 
self. As for Madame Sophie, hers was an upright, but an 
indolent nature. " I never saw anybody with such a timid 
air," says Madame Campan. " She walked very briskly, and 
in order to recognize the people who moved aside for her, 
without seeming to look at them, she had adopted the habit 
of looking out of the corner of her eye, as hares do. She 
was so terribly bashful that one might see her every day for 
years without hearing her utter a word. Yet there were 
times when she would suddenly become most affable and 
gracious, and communicative too. This occurred in stormy 
weather : she was so afraid of it that she would then volun- 
tarily approach persons of the least consequence, and ask 
them a thousand questions most condescendingly. If there 
came a flash of lightning, she would grasp their hands, and 
would have embraced them at a thunder-clap." 

Madame Louise, the youngest of the daughters of Louis 
XV., was at the Carmelite convent at St. Denis, and we have 
seen that the dauphine paid her a visit there even before she 
arrived at Versailles. The ceremony of taking the veil was 
performed on the loth September, 1770, and Marie-Antoi- 
nette was present. The Pope's nuncio said mass, and 
Madame Louise de France, known in the community as 
Sister Therese-Augustine, received the sacrament. Before 
assuming the sackcloth garment, the princess dressed her- 



158 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

self for the last time in royal attire, — a robe of cloth of silver, 
with flowers of gold scattered through it. Resplendent with 
glistening jewels, a diadem upon her head, and surrounded 
by the lords and ladies who had once composed her house- 
hold, she stood forth in a cloud of incense, — an apotheosis 
one would have said. 

The Bishop of Troyes then delivered a discourse of 
such touching solemnity that, in the words of the Abbe 
Proyart, who described the ceremony, every listener shed 
tears, save only the strong-hearted woman for whom they 
were shed. 

The discourse at an end, all the pomp and show van- 
ished. After a momentary absence, the daughter of the 
king returned, clad in Carmelite costume, and received 
the veil and mantle of a nun from the hands of the 
dauphine. 



IX. 

MARIE-ANTOINETTE AND MADAME DU BARRY. 

MARIE-ANTOINETTE, universally courted and ad- 
mired, seemed to have attained the summit of earthly 
felicity. On the surface, her future seemed destined to be 
all that heart could wish. But in the depths of her heart 
she was already fearful of ill to come. Her husband's 
inexplicable lack of warmth was not her only cause of 
chagrin. Young as she was, she began to be aware of the 
snares and pitfalls of every description with which her path 
was beset by her ill-wishers. The very embodiment of in- 
nocence, sweetness, and frankness, she was forced to dwell 
in an atmosphere of paltry jealousies, machiavellian plots, 
and interminable intrigue. She had constantly to submit 
to a minute and often spiteful scrutiny. All eyes were 
fastened upon her. Beneath hyperbolical flattery and the 
warmest praise, was hidden much unkind criticism and a 
world of jealousy and, incredible as it seems, of hatred. The 
dauphine was disliked for being young and pretty. All the 
coquettes who had had their day, all the old maids and 
ambitious schemers, found it very hard to put up with her 
superior attractions in the matter of birth and rank, as well 
as grace and loveliness. Envy was craftily hidden under the 



i6o The Last Years of Louis XV. 

mask of politics. They complained that the dauphine 
represented the Austrian alliance, which, they said, was 
directly opposed to all the traditions of French diplomacy. 
They took it ill of her to be the daughter of a great 
empress, whose genius had performed such marvels. 

The creatures of Madame du Barry were quite obscured by 
the young couple, to whom the future belonged, and who 
at the time stood as a sort of mute protest of virtue against 
vice, of purity against shame. All the Basils of the court — 
and God knows how many there were of them — were only 
too eager to begin, very gently and softly, and on the sly, to 
spread the slanderous accusations, the crescendo of which was 
so terrible. 

One of Marie-Antoinette's great crosses vv^as the having 
everywhere to come in contact with Madame du Barry, that 
nobody's daughter, who assumed to treat with her upon a foot- 
ing of equality, and whom Maria Theresa, a little too politic, 
perhaps, had directed her to conciliate, out of respect for 
Louis XV., — the woman who was the bitter enemy of the 
Due de Choiseul, the mainstay of the Austrian alliance at the 
Court of Versailles. Her pride revolted at the necessity, as 
she remembered, with a toss of her shapely aristocratic head, 
the blood that flowed in her veins, and the fire that shone in 
her eyes ; and the daughter of the Caesars conceived an 
intense dislike for the favorite who degraded the throne. 

She wrote to Maria Theresa, July gth, 1770: " The king 
shows his regard for me in a thousand ways, and I love him 
dearly ; but his weakness for Madame du Barry is pitiable, for 



Marie- Antoinette and Madame du Barry. i6i 

she is the most foolish and impertinent creature you can 
imagine." 

The two were rivals in the field of politics, for one wished 
to retain Choiseul in the ministry, while the other was bent 
upon overthrowing him. Two hostile camps were formed, 
and the excitement was intense; but Madame du Barry's 
triumph was a foregone conclusion. The Due de Choiseul, 
intoxicated by success, and accustomed for so long to 
triumph over every obstacle, believed himself to be not 
only necessary to the king, but absolutely indispensable. 
The powerful minister was quite capable of saying of his 
enemies what the Due de Guise said shortly before his 
fall, " They would not dare." The political chess-board was 
so complicated that any man who was so well acquainted 
with the position of all the pieces as he, might well think 
that Louis XV. would not have the courage to dismiss 
him. 

The Baron de Gleichen, one of Choiseul's strongest 
friends, considered him imprudent to the point of folly. " It 
would have been very easy," says the baron, in his interesting 
" Souvenirs," " to patch up a peace with Madame du Barry, 
who would have asked nothina: better than to be delivered 
from the rapacious and tyrannical claws of her brother and 
his patrons, and all the roues whose tool she was. She was 
a good soul, too, sorry to be employed in doing harm, and 
her joyous temperament would have been delighted with M. 
de Choiseul as soon as she really knew him. The king would 
certainly have attempted the impossible to bring about and 



1 62 The Last Years of Lotus XV. 

cement an alliance between his favorite and his minister, 
whom he was very sorry to part with. Nothing could prove 
this more convincingly than a letter which he wrote him 
towards the last, when they wrote to" each other much 
oftener than they met. M. de Choiseul having complained 
of a formidable cabal, whose machinations he feared, the 
king replied : — 

' Your imagination is all astray ; you have been deceived. Be 
on your guard against those who surround you, who are no friends 
of mine. You do not know Madame du Barry ; all France would be 
at her feet if . . . [Signed] LouiS.' 

" Did not this letter, which I myself saw, express a desire 
for an accommodation between the two, and beg him to do 
his part.f" And did it not contain the avowal, most singular 
for a king to make, that the single voice of his minister 
would have more effect than the whole power of royalty? "* 

The following reflection of M. de Gleichen is in accord 
with the taste and style of the eighteenth century : " It is 
very surprising that a man with M. de Choiseul's common- 
sense should have been obdurate in the face of such 
kindness, and should have declined the opportunity of turn- 
ing the tables upon all his enemies, and of making sure 
of the stability of his power, with the assistance of a woman 
who would have been entirely at his orders." 

The Due de Choiseul had been the favorite of Madame 
de Pompadour ; therefore it could not have been from moral 

* Souvenirs du Baron de Gleichen, preceded by a notice by M. Paul 
Grimblot. i vol. T^chener. 



Marie- Antoinette and Madame du Barry. 163 

scruples that he refused to make his peace with Madame 
du Barry, for so far as public scandal was concerned, the two 
mistresses were on a par ; and in the matter of disposition, 
the comtesse had much the advantage of the marquise. 

But the great lord, more vain of his person than his 
place ; the daring statesman, more influential and more 
courted than his master, and who said to his friends, " Do 
not rely upon the king, you will get nothing by that;" the 
haughty duke and peer who remembered that in former 
days a man of his high rank would have thought that he 
bemeaned himself by accepting the place of Secretary of 
State, and who considered that he did much honor to Louis 
XV. in consenting to make one of his ministry, — Choiseul, 
infatuated with his triumphs, was no longer the clever cour- 
tier of Madame de Pompadour's time. 

The idea of bending the knee to a low-born sultana 
revolted the pride of this grand vizier who had no fear of the 
halter. As M. Jobez has well said, in his " La France sous 
Louis XV.," " He was one of those men of pleasure who dip 
into politics as an avocation which interests their imagination 
and tickles their vanity." He had no thought of subjecting 
himself to aught which shocked his sense of propriety or 
offended his taste. Madame du Barry was offensive to him, 
and he defied her. The bare idea that the minister who had 
concluded the "family pact," and had annexed Corsica to 
France ; who had dared to enter the lists against the most 
powerful of modern societies, the Jesuits ; who was the 
idol of nobility, parliaments, and philosophes ; whose glory 



1 64 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

was borne on every breeze that blew, by the blaring of all the 
trumpets of Renown, and who had succeeded in making 
himself feared and admired by all Europe, — the bare idea 
that he, the Due de Choiseul, could be sacrificed to a 
creature of the Du Barry stamp, seemed to him the height 
of improbability and absurdity. 

Nevertheless, that was just what happened. Let us 
hasten to say, however, that the hostility of the comtesse 
was not the sole cause of the minister's fall. Although he 
was supported by the dauphine, the dauphin was hostile to 
him, because he Lad said, some years before, to that prince's 
father : " Monseigneur, I may perhaps some day have the 
misfortune of being your subject; but I shall never have 
that of being your servant." 

Religious people blamed him for the expulsion of the 
Jesuits, and for the friendship of Voltaire. Conservatives 
accused him of a weakness for the parliaments. Partisans 
of peace at any price considered his foreign policy irritating, 
and likely to cause trouble. They charged him with being 
upon the point of doing what Louvois had done under 
Louis XIV., — of setting Europe in a blaze to prove that the 
War Department was in skilful hands. 

Louis XV., whose timidity increased as he advanced 
in years, was alarmed, perhaps with good reason. The alli- 
ance of the Northern courts already existed in the germ. 
England's attitude was threatening, and a conflict between 
English and Spaniards had just broken out in the Falkland 
Islands. Louis XV. was led to believe that a coalition was 



Marie-Antoinette and Madame du Barry. 165 

imminent, and a repetition of the Seven Years' War, which 
would be due, they said, entirely to the imprudence and 
inconsequence of Choiseul. The enemies of the minister 
then notified Madame du Barry that the moment had come 
to bring matters to a crisis. Dealers in anecdotes told of 
her playing with oranges, and crying as she tossed them 
about, laughing uproariously, " Trump, Choiseul ! Trump, 
Praslin ! " It was also said that after telling Louis that she 
had dismissed her cook, she said to her royal adorer : " I 
have got rid of my Choiseul : when will you do as much 
by yours ? " 

On the 24th December, 1770, the minister received a 
letter from the king in these words : — 

My Cousin, — My dissatisfaction with your services compels me 
to send you into exile at Chanteloup, whither you will betake your- 
self within twenty-four hours. I should have sent you much farther 
away, except for my special esteem for Madame la Duchesse de 
Choiseul, in whose well-being I am much interested. Be careful 
that your conduct does not compel me to take more severe measures. 
With this, I pray God, my Cousin, to have you in his holy keeping. 

[Signed] Louis. 

Then was seen a phenomenon, which, as M. Henri 
Martin has said, was probably never seen before, — the court 
faithful to one who was in disgrace. During the few hours 
which the Due and Duchesse de Choiseul passed at Paris, 
before setting out for Chanteloup, an enormous number of 
great lords and ladies, magistrates, military men, bourgeois, 
and men of letters wrote their names upon the register at 



1 66 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

their mansion. The young Due de Chartres, afterwards so 
well known under the name of Philippe Egalite, forced his 
way by the sentry, to cast himself into the arms of the exiled 
minister!* The most exalted personages sought the king's 
permission to pay a visit at Chanteloup. 

Was it that human nature had changed for the better, 
and had become more generous than at other epochs ? By 
no manner of means. It was because opposition was fashion- 
able at the moment. Moreover, it was the general opinion 
that Choiseul would return to power. 

The Comte de Segur says, in his " Memoires:" " The king 
remained almost alone in his mistress's boudoir. A column 
which was set up at Chanteloup, on which the names of the 
numerous visitors were inscribed, served as a monument to 
this new Fronde. The impressions of the young are apt to 
be very vivid, and I shall never forget my delight when I 
saw my father's name and my own carved upon that column 
of opposition, — a forerunner of other acts of resistance, which 
assumed such grave importance in the sequel. From one 
end of the kingdom to the other, opposition became a point 
of honor : it seemed a clear duty to high-minded persons, a 
virtuous act to men of generous impulse, to i\-\Q pkilosophes a 
useful weapon to employ in reasserting the freedom of man- 
kind, — in short, it was a method of making a sensation, and 
became, so to speak, a fashion which was largely adopted by 
the young generation. The parliaments made remonstrances, 

* See the interesting work of M. Grasset : " Madame de Choiseul et son 
temps." I vol. Didier, 



Marie- Antoinette and Madame du Barry. 167 

the priests preached sermons, the philosophes wrote books, 
and the young courtiers turned out epigrams. Every one, 
feeling that the hehii was in unskilled hands, defied a gov- 
ernment which no longer insjoired confidence or respect." 

Madame du Barry, whose character was but poorly adapted 
for political strife, was amazed at her own triumph. But 
Marie- Antoinette had not witnessed the fall of the devoted 
friend of the house of Austria without a feeling of bitter 
indignation. Maria Theresa, alarmed at the occurrenqe, 
desired that her daughter should conciliate the omnipotent 
favorite ; but the repugnance which she aroused in the 
dauphine was greater every day. On the 2d Sept. 1771, 
the Comte de Mercy-Argenteau wrote to the empress : 

"Your Majesty will have deigned to notice, in my first, very 
humble report, that M. le Dauphin had approved my suggestions 
as to the advisability of Madame la Dauphine not treating the Com- 
tesse du Barry with too much severity. This point seems to me 
more essential than ever, because it is the source of all the trouble, 
and of all the deplorable steps which the king may allow himself to 
be drawn into to signify his displeasure with his children. The 
opportunities which I have had of meeting the favorite have put me 
in a way to know her. She seems to have little mind, and to be very 
frivolous and vain, with no symptoms of a designing or vindictive 
disposition. It is very easy to draw her into conversation, and very 
often much information may be gained from her, she is so heedless 
in what she says. I am assured that if Madame la Dauphine could 
only bring herself to speak to her once, it would then be very easy 
for me to stop all pretension to anything beyond that, and to put an 
end to a thousand embarrassments, which spring from the strange 
condition of things, in the interior of this court." 



1 68 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

Maria Theresa fully agreed with her ambassador. She 
wrote Marie-Antoinette a letter on the 30th September, 1771, 
in which she urged her to treat Madame du Barry as she 
would any lady who was admitted to the court and to the 
society of the king. Declaring that the dauphine, as her 
sovereign's first subject, owed obedience and submission to 
Louis XV., she added : " You should set the example to the 
court and courtiers, so that your master's will may be exe- 
cuted. If base actions or familiarity were demanded of you, 
neither myself nor anybody else could advise you to yield ; 
but an indifferent word and a look or two, not for the woman, 
but for your grandfather, your master, your benefactor ! " 

Maria Theresa's words to the contrary notwithstanding, it 
was much to be deplored that a grandfather should choose 
to inflict such companionship upon his grandson's wife. 

The legitimate and worthy pride of Marie-Antoinette 
suffered sadly. " The Comtesse du Barry's ascendency 
over the king's mind is now entirely without limit," wrote 
the Comte de Mercy, December 19, 1771 ; "it is unmis- 
takably evident in all that concerns the royal family; and 
the more the favorite is mortified by uncivil treatment, the 
harder she tries to take advantage of every opportunity to 
show her resentment." 

The Comte de Mercy, who, according to the instructions 
of the empress, was untiring in his endeavors to induce the 
dauphine to be civil to the favorite, at last succeeded in 
his suit to a certain extent. He relates it with much satis- 
faction in a letter of the 14th August, 1772. He says that, 



Marie- Antoinette and Madame du Barry. 169 

Madame du Barry having arrived, after the king s mass, vi^ith 
the Duchesse d'Aiguillon, " Madame la Dauphine spoke to 
the last-named ; then, turning to the favorite, she made a few 
remarks about the weather and the hunting, so that although 
she did not directly address the Comtesse du Barry, she was 
at liberty to believe that the words were addressed to her as 
well as to the Duchesse d'Aiguillon. Nothing more was 
necessary to content the favorite. The king, upon being 
informed of what had taken place, seemed much pleased 
thereat, and signified his gratification to Madame la Dau- 
phine by various little attentions that evening during the 
state supper." 

Marie-Antoinette, however, despite her desire to do as her 
mother urged, could not overcome the repugnance inspired 
by the woman whose favor was such a scandal and disgrace. 
In a letter which she wrote her mother on the 21st Janu- 
ary, 1772, the dauphine could not hide her heartfelt dread 
of certain possible exigencies. " Madame, my dearest 
mother," said she, " you can well believe that I always 
sacrifice my prejudices and my dislike so long as nothing 
disreputable or dishonorable is proposed. It would be the 
sorrow of my life if anything should happen to make trouble 
between my two families ; my heart would be always on the 
side of my own, and my duties here would be very hard to 
fulfil. I shudder at the thought." 

The noble frankness of Marie-Antoinette touched Maria 
Theresa to the quick. The empress, accustomed, whether 
as mother or sovereign, to undisputed domination, answered 



lyo The Last Years of Louis XV. 

her daughter's letter on the 13th February: " You have made 
me laugh, with your fancy that either I or my minister could 
ever advise you to do anything dishonorable, or even in the 
least degree improper. See from this how strong a hold 
prejudice and bad advice have taken upon your mind ! Your 
agitation makes me tremble for you. What interest can I 
have other than your good and that of your country, the 
dauphin's happiness and your own, and the critical situation 
of yourself and the whole kingdom and royal family, sur- 
rounded by intrigue and faction } Who can give you better 
advice than my minister, who knows the whole nation 
through and through, and the influences which are at work 
there.? You must follow his advice upon every subject with- 
out exception, and you must, by a measured and logical 
course of action, prepare yourself for anything that may 
happen." 

Maria Theresa's persistence in this direction was due to 
her knowledge that all the powers hostile to Austria were at 
that very moment redoubling their efforts to conciliate the 
favorite, and to break off the alliance between the courts of 
Versailles and Vienna. " We know beyond question," she 
wrote to her ambassador, " that England and the King of 
Prussia are trying to win over the Barry : you ought to 
know better than I if it is so. The king is constant in his 
friendships, and I venture to appeal to his heart ; but he is 
weak, and those who surround him will not give him time to 
reflect. If France allows herself to be wheedled by Prussia, 
who will inevitably betray her, then I ought to say to you 



Marie- Antoinette and Madame dti Barry. 171 

that it is the only circumstance which would make it abso- 
lutely necessary for me to change my policy; to my great 
regret, it is true, but it would be unavoidable. To avoid 
these evil and vexatious consequences for my monarchy and 
my family, we must use every possible means ; and there is 
nobody but my daughter, assisted by your advice and your 
knowledge of the surroundings, who is in a position to 
render this service to her family and her fatherland. Before 
everything, she must, by assiduous and affectionate advances, 
win the king's good graces ; she must try to divine his 
thoughts, so as to run counter to him in nothing ; and she 
must treat the favorite well. I do not ask my daughter to 
bemean herself, still less to become intimate with the favor- 
ite, but by such attentions as would be a fitting mark of her 
consideration for her grandfather and master, to gain any 
advantage which may accrue therefrom to us and to both 
courts : perhaps the continuance of the alliance depends 
upon it." 

Oh, the paltriness of human grandeur ! A woman 
endowed with brain and heart and genius, a Maria Theresa, 
allowing the friendship of the mightiest empires of the 
world, the maintenance of the general equilibrium, and the 
destiny of Europe, to depend upon the fiat of a Du Barry ! 
Poor Marie-Antoinette, more to be pitied than envied; for 
all the splendor of her loveliness, for all her prestige, she 
became what she was to be to the day of her death, — the 
victim of politics. 



X. 

THE DAUPHINE AND MARIA THERESA. 

THERE is not to be found in all history a more 
interesting series of letters than those which passed 
between the Empress Maria Theresa and her ambassador 
at Versailles, the Comte de Mercy- Argenteau. Never has 
the character of a sovereign, and the tact and talent of a 
diplomat, been more strikingly revealed. 

In her letters Maria Theresa appeared just what she 
really was, — a clever politician, accustomed to power and 
domination ; a brainy woman, whom nothing escaped, and 
who managed everything ; a mother who inspired veneration 
and awe in her children ; a sovereign who busied herself 
about the concerns of her family and her empire with equal 
solicitude and equal authority. Her advice was equivalent 
to a command, her language that of one who meant to be 
obeyed. Although her daughter had become French, she 
continued to look upon her as a German princess, and it was 
her desire to make her a sort of Austrian ambassadress, 
accredited to Louis XV., but under the orders of the Comte 
de Mercy. The empress was surprised to find that a young 
girl of fifteen had not the experience and the mature power 
of insight of a woman of middle age, and she did not recog- 



The DaupJiine and Maria Theresa. 173 

nize Marie-Antoinette's right to be anything less than perfect 
in every respect. In her eyes, the dauphine was still the 
little scholar of Schonbrunn and the Burg. 

Maria Theresa, like most rulers, had a passionate desire 
to be well posted on every subject. The most trivial details 
were interesting to her. She desired to be kept informed as 
to all the minutiae of her daughter's physical and moral 
status. Nothing escaped her observation, and she thought 
of everything; dress, reading, conversation, dancing, driving, 
everything came under her incessant and rigid scrutiny. 
She might have been actually living at the palace of 
Versailles, and have been less familiar with all its details 
than she was. She did live there in spirit; and she knew 
all its secrets, and all the snares laid for the unwary. Over 
and over again she said to her daughter, " Take care ! " 
As well instructed in the peculiarities of the French char- 
acter as if she had lived in France all her life, she was no 
stranger to the frivolity, the wickedness, the ingratitude, and 
the cowardice of mankind, and knew what depths of base- 
ness and envy exist in the make-up of many courtiers. The 
glamour of the Capitol did not make her forget the Tarpeian 
Rock ; and at certain times her words were so sad, and her 
thoughts of the future so anxious, that it would seem as if 
she had foreseen the destiny of her Antoinette, and had 
caught a glimpse of the scaffold looming in the distance. 

The empress's correspondent, too, was a model for diplo- 
matists. Supple, energetic, reserved ; very clever in putting 
himself upon good terms with those who might be useful 



174 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

to his mission ; persona grata to Louis XV. and the royal 
family, to the Due de Choiseul and the Due d'Aiguillon, to 
the devout churchmen and the Comtesse du Barry ; a keen 
observer of the first rank, and an untiring worker ; exact even 
in trifles, cautious to an extreme point, skilful in manoeu- 
vring all the pieces in the most involved game of politics, 
— the Comte de Mercy-Argenteau was heart and soul in his 
profession. 

When he prepared his "very humble reports" for his 
sovereign, he expended an excessive amount of care and 
earnestness upon them. If he was fortunate enough to 
receive the congratulations of "her sacred majesty," as he 
always called the empress, his joy knew no bounds. His 
letters to Maria Theresa, written independently of his official 
despatches, form a complete journal of the dauphine's exis- 
tence. Everything is there set down at its proper day and 
hour. The ambassador knows everything which takes place 
in the princess's salon, and knows also what does not take 
place in her alcove. A lady's maid, a physician, — what shall 
I say ? — a father confessor, could have no more accurate 
information. 

The dauphine was still a mere child. Sweet, innocent, 
and ingenuous, ignorant of evil ; making a little fun of 
etiquette ; sincerely religious, but always charming in her 
piety ; sighing for Vienna, but loving Versailles ; German in 
memory, but French at heart; overflowing with respect and 
affection for her august mother, but finding her words at 
times a little harsh,- — the fascinating princess, thanks to the 



The Dauphine and Maria Theresa. 175 

inexplicable coldness of the husband, was a maid still, 
though a wife. 

Suppose she had a venial fault or two ; suppose that 
from time to time she was guilty of some trifling acts of 
imprudence, which she was to expiate so cruelly some day, — 
they were at most the faults and follies which had the excuse 
of youth, and its charm as well. Marie-Antoinette had 
spirits suited to her age ; she had also its animation and 
sprightliness and thoughtlessness ; and it was those very 
qualities which gave to her features a sympathetic and 
feminine charm. 

The lovely dauphine, who called Louis XV. " Papa," and 
leaped upon his neck without asking leave ; who, like the 
child that she was, took especial delight in the companion- 
ship of children ; and who, when her maid of honor, the 
strict and pin-sticking Comtesse de Noailles, appeared, would 
say, with a laugh, " We must be on our good behavior now, 
here comes Madame Etiquette," — this lovely and unaffected 
princess was as different from her surroundings as spring is 
different from winter. She was like young trees, filled with 
sap, which spring up in the free air of the open fields, and 
not like the sickly shrubbery in the park at Versailles, which 
has to grow by rule and square. Her simple manners were 
her brightest ornament, and her long fair hair her richest 
diadem ; nor could any of her jewels be compared to the 
brilliancy of her eyes. 

And yet this same princess, whose innocence and love- 
liness ought to have touched every heart, was already 



176 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

surrounded by enemies, incredible as it seems. Mercy- 
Argenteau wrote, on the i6th April, 1771: — 

" It would be well nigh impossible for your Majesty to form 
any conceptions of the horrible confusion which prevails here in 
every direction. The throne is degraded by the rapid growth of the 
favorite's influence, and by the villainy of her adherents. The 
nation is alive with seditious utterances and indecent publications, 
in which the monarch's person is not spared. I have not hesitated 
to present the picture to Madame la Dauphine, and to impress upon 
her strongly that the only possible way to avoid embarrassment at 
so critical a period is to maintain a profound silence as to persons 
and affairs alike ; and her Royal Highness is beginning to realize the 
necessity of adopting that course of action." 

The young girl, with her open and expansive disposition, 
was expected to bear herself like an old diplomat. She must 
carefully weigh and calculate the effect of her every move- 
ment, her every word, and even of her silence. Everything 
was remarked, everything commented upon and criticised. 
The court, for all its majestic exterior, was a perfect ant-hill 
of petty passions and petty intrigues. Nothing but mines 
and countermines, traps, coalitions, and cabals. There was 
Madame du Barry's camp, which was also that of the min- 
isters ; the camp of Madame Adelaide and her sisters ; the 
camp of the friends of the Due de Choiseul ; and the camp 
of the Comte de Provence, who, though a mere boy, was 
already a skilful politician. 

The partisans of Madame du Barry, who dreaded the 
future ascendency of the dauphine, fed upon the hope, not 



The Datiphine and Maria Theresa. 177 

only that she would never be a mother, but that her husband 
would continue to be as shy and timid as at first. There 
were people who went so far as to hint at a possible rupture 
of the marriage. The dauphine's movements were watched 
in the most annoying way. Her letters were read, and pages 
were torn from her writing-books, with the evident purpose 
of imitating her handwriting. She was terribly troubled to 
find that there were duplicate keys to her furniture, and she 
was forced to hide her mother's letters under her pillow, in 
order to preserve them. 

This extraordinary state of affairs engrossed much of 
Maria Theresa's thought. She was particularly bitter against 
" Mesdames." * Though she recognized their good qualities 
and their unassailable virtue, she was jealous of them, and 
criticised them constantly. She would not allow that these 
princesses had any right to give their niece the least advice. 

" I confess," she wrote to the Comte de Mercy-Argenteau, 
February 11, 1771, "that my daughter's situation makes me 
very uneasy, in view of the stormy condition of affairs at the 
French court. Her indifference, her disinclination for seri- 
ous application, her want of tact (which is due to her 
youth and light-heartedness), her intimacy with her aunts, 
especially Madame Adelaide, who is the most scheming and 
expansive of the sisters, give me more than one reason for 
alarm." 

Maria Theresa, who was German to her finger-ends, 
and who, although she was anxious for the French alliance, 

* The king's daughters. 
12 



178 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

had no liking for the French nation, was in a measure 
jealous of the former archduchess's affection for her new- 
country. " There is much cause for wonder," she wrote 
her, " in the very slight interest you exhibit in the Germans. 
Believe me, France will esteem you more, and place more 
reliance upon you, if you show that you possess the Ger- 
man steadfastness and frankness. Do not be ashamed 
that you are a German, even when it makes you appear 
awkward." 

We can understand that a dauphine of France would 
require a large store of filial respect not to be somewhat 
annoyed at this too Germanic advice. The empress was 
more nearly on the right track when she wrote to her 
daughter on the 9th July, 1771, in very sensible though 
severe language : " I look in vain every month for the list of 
the books you have read, and your other occupations. At 
your age, one must expect many foolish and puerile notions ; 
but at last they will bore everybody else as well as yourself, 
and you will be much the worse therefor. I cannot conceal 
from you that it is already beginning to be talked about, and 
you will lose in that way the excellent opinion which people 
have formed of you, — a most essential point for us who are 
actors on the world's stage. A life of continual dissipation, 
without the least pretence of serious occupation, will ever 
tend to deaden your conscience." 

At times the mother's exhortations to her daughter 
became veritable reprimands, and her pen was like a rod 
of chastisement. Take, for instance, the letter of the 30th 



The Dauphine and Maria Theresa. 179 

September of the same year (1771), wherein, complaining 
especially that the dauphine is not sufficiently civil to 
Madame du Barry, the imperious sovereign cries in a 
passion : " And so you fail your benefactor on the very 
first occasion on which you might oblige him ! And for 
what reason, pray? From a disgraceful subservience to 
people who have conquered you by treating you like a 
child, and getting up horse-races for you, upon donkeys, 
with children and dogs ! Such are the weighty reasons 
which draw you to them rather than to your master, and 
which will make you ridiculous in the long run, and destroy 
all love and esteem for you. And you began so well! Your 
face, and your judgment, when not prejudiced by others, 
are always to be depended upon. I demand that you con- 
vince the king of your respect and affection by your every 
act, and by divining at every opportunity what will please 
him, even though you should thereby embroil yourself with 
all the others; for you have but one end to keep in view, — 
to please the king, and do what he wishes." 

Marie-Antoinette, accustomed to respect her mother as 
much as God himself, always bowed to the authority which 
admitted no rejoinder. She sometimes happened to forget 
certain injunctions, but she was surely excusable in that. 
As the Comte de Mercy wrote the empress, in a letter of the 
i6th June, 1772, " The deplorable tone of her associates, and 
being accustomed to receive neither reprimand nor contra- 
diction, not even advice, from the king or M. le Dauphin, 
added to the distance of three hundred leagues which sepa- 



i8o The Last Years of Louis XV. 

rates her from you, are doubtless the reasons why your stern 
letters have not always produced the desired effect." 

But Maria Theresa melted sometimes. From reprimands 
she often passed to loving words. Her maternal pride is 
expressed now and then in accents worthy of Madame de 
Sevigne. On the 31st October, 1771, she wrote to her 
daughter : " You have something so moving about you 
that it is very hard to refuse you; it is a gift from God, to 
whom you must give your thanks for it, while you make use 
of it for his glory and the welfare of your fellow-creatures." 

It was because she wished her to be perfect, physically 
and morally, that she said to her, in a letter of the 31st 
December, 1772: "What! At twelve and thirteen years, 
Antoinette could receive her friends very prettily, and greet 
each one with a courteous and graceful word. That this 
is true, all Vienna, the Empire, Lorraine and France know, 
because they saw it. And now the dauphine is embarrassed 
to receive a mere private person ! Do not get in the habit 
of making such frivolous excuses as embarrassment, fear, 
shyness, and caprice. It is a very bad habit to yield without 
thought or reflection to such suggestions. You know that 
your affability won everybody's heart, and you see the oppo- 
site every day. Can you make up your mind to neglect 
this important matter.? I bring my sermons to an end 
with the old year; you do me great injustice if you do not 
take them as the surest proof of my affection and my 
interest in your future welfare, which is an absorbing subject 
of my thoughts." 



The Dmiphine and Maria Theresa. i8i 

Marie-Antoinette, who was goodness and sensibility per- 
sonified, bore her mother no ill-will for her sometimes 
roughly worded advice, and her filial devotion was never 
in abeyance. In a letter of the Comte de Mercy-Argenteau 
(29th February, 1772), we may read of the grief of the lovely 
dauphine upon learning of her mother's illness. " At the 
first word, Madame la Dauphine seemed so alarmed that she 
could hardly comprehend. She returned to her cabinet 
weeping bitterly, and could say nothing, except that she was 
unable to give audience. She asked for a rosary which your 
Majesty sent her, and began to pray. M. le Dauphin, who 
remained by her side, seemed to sympathize very sincerely 
with the sorrow of his august spouse." 

Maria Theresa complained sometimes that her daughter's 
letters were not long enough. She did not fully realize all 
the obstacles there were to the princess's writing her in 
peace. M. de Mercy-Argenteau said that Marie-Antoinette 
always wrote in a hurry, in mortal dread of being caught in 
the act by her husband or her aunts, to whom she never 
showed her letters to her mother. Her correspondence 
was certainly not a masterpiece of style. But, after all, 
could a young German girl be expected to write French 
like an academician? Marie-Antoinette's letters have, at all 
events, the merit of being simple, unaffected, albeit without 
literary pretension, and of proving that she was endowed 
with a kind heart, a pure conscience, and a frank and open 
disposition. 

If instead of studying history only on the surface, we 



1 82 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

dig deeper, we are often surprised to find how little differ- 
ence there really is between a sovereign and a private 
individual. The great Maria Theresa, the illustrious empress, 
notwithstanding the prestige of her lofty rank, inevitably 
reminds us of the worthy mothers of the middle class, who 
are forever saying to their daughters, " Be sure and do what 
is right." Palace, hovel, garret, under all your roofs, the 
same joys and sorrows abide, the same passions and the 
same disappointments. 

To sum up, Maria Theresa's strictures upon her daughter 
amount to nothing serious, and at any other time the 
dauphine would have received nothing but commendation. 
But men's minds were then inclined to be critical on all 
subjects, and the first breath of the Revolution was blowing 
upon the society of France. 

However, the fascinating and incomparable dauphine 
was still the idol of court and nation. What grace, what 
brilliancy, what attractive qualities ! And so young, too, 
and yet she eclipsed all other women ! What a contrast 
between her and her two sisters-in-law, the Comtesse de 
Provence and the Comtesse d'Artois ! Everywhere and 
always Marie-Antoinette stands first, — first in grace, and 
first in loveliness. It seemed as if she were already seated 
on the throne. When the chorus, at the beginning of the 
second act of Gluck's " Iphigenie," cried, " Chantons, cele- 
brons notre reine " [Let us sing the praises of our queen], 
the audience turned towards the dauphine, and saluted her 
with great enthusiasm, as if her reign had already begun. 



The Dauphine and Maria Theresa. 183 

How her vivacity and her sweet smile lighted up the 
great palace at Versailles, which was so gloomy and 
forbidding without her! What life and animation char- 
acterized the select balls which she gave on Mondays in her 
apartments ! There, people danced for love of dancing, 
without ceremony, and untrammelled by etiquette. The 
ladies wore white dominos, and the gentlemen their ordinary 
garments. There shone one of the most poetic and sym- 
pathetic souls of the age, the Princesse de Lamballe, a 
young widow of twenty years, who was to be the truest and 
most faithful friend of Marie-Antoinette, — the Princesse de 
Lamballe, who devoted herself with such affectionate care 
to her father-in-law, the venerable Due de Penthievre, of 
whom Florian said, in addressing to him the dedication of a 
Biblical poem, * — 

" Pieux comme Booz, austere avec douceur, 
Vous aimez les humains et craignez le Seigneur. 
Helas ! un seul soutien manque a votre famille : 
Vous n'epousez pas Ruth, mais vous I'avez pour fille." f 

It was at these Monday balls, where none but the inner 
circle of the nobility could gain admittance, that those young- 
persons made their first appearance in society who were to 
become leaders and arbiters of fashion, — those great lords 

* See the interesting work of iVI. de Lescure, La Princesse de Lamballe. 
I vol. Plon. 

f " Pious as Boaz, mingling gentleness with austerity, you love your fellow-raen 
and fear the Lord. Alas ! but one source of strength is lacking to your family : 
you did not marry Ruth, although you have her for a daughter." 



184 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

with liberal principles, types of the new France, and who 
bore the historic names of Lafayette, Lauzun, La Marck, 
Segur, Dillon, Noailles, and Lameth. 

But these Monday functions were not enough ; other 
balls were given on Wednesdays in the apartments of the 
Comtesse de Noailles, Marie-Antoinette's maid of honor. 
The dauphine went to the first of these, leaning on 
the arm of her husband, who said to the comtesse as 
they entered the room, " I trust, Madame, that you will 
not object to receive a husband and wife who come to 
share your enjoyment, not to cast a damper upon the 
party." * 

The dauphin and the Comte de Provence were a little 
awkward in their dancing; but their shortcomings were more 
than made up by the Comte d'Artois, that beau ideal of 
society men, who was an accomplished dancer. And as for 
Marie-Antoinette, as graceful as she was fair to look upon, 
and as quick of movement as she was fascinating, she had 
the bearing of a goddess. 

" Et vera incessu patuit dea." 

Her only failing was her inclination to make sport of every- 
thing. Like the Comte de la Marck, she was merciless in 
ridiculing every one who was ugly or dull. She loved youth, 
and she chose that every one should be light-hearted and 
should drive dull care far away. Ah, how lovely she was in 
the winters of 1771 and 1772, when she and the Princesse de 

* Letter from the Comte de Mercy to Maria Theresa, 25th February, 1771. 



The Dauphine and Maria Theresa. 185 

Lamballe passed so much time in her favorite sport, — those 
sledge races upon the ice, which were hke a dream of the 
poetic North ! And how majestic and grand she was on the 
8th June, 1773, the day of her solemn entry into Paris, when 
she visited in royal state the cathedral of Notre Dame, the 
church of St. Genevieve, and the palace of the Tuileries 
in a state carriage glittering with gold, drawn by eight horses, 
and followed by five equipages only less magnificent than 
her own. 

The heavens re-echoed the enthusiastic shouts ; all hats 
were in the air, all hearts in an ecstasy of joy, and all hands 
joined in tumultuous applause. Cries of " Vive la dauphine " 
issued from every throat. At every step the smiling and 
radiant princess might hear such exclamations as " How 
pretty she is ! How lovely she is ! What a sweet expression 
she has ! " From every balcony and every window, flowers 
fell like rain. The feeling manifested was something more 
than joy or admiration, it was downright intoxication, a very 
delirium of happiness. Touched to the depths of her soul, 
and forgetful for the moment of her melancholy and gloomy 
presentiments, Marie-Antoinette, always affectionate and 
easily moved, wrote in happy mood to her mother to tell 
her of the unparalleled y?/^, the memory of which was always 
so sweet to her. 

" Upon returning from our drive," she wrote in a letter of 
the 14th June, " we had seats upon an open terrace [at the 
Tuileries], and remained there about half an hour. I can- 
not tell you, dearest Mamma, of the enthusiastic evidences of 



1 86 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

' affection which we received at that time. Before withdraw- 
ing, we waved our hands to the populace, to their great delight. 
How fortunate we are to be able to win the love of a whole 
nation for the little we have done ! There can be nothing 
else so precious as that. I feel it deeply, and I shall never 
forget it. Another point which gave great satisfaction on that 
day of days was the bearing and behavior of M. le Dauphin. 
He replied with marvellous aptness to all the speeches, was 
quick to take note of everything that was done for him, and 
especially of the striking earnestness and happiness of the 
people, whom he treated with the greatest affability. To- 
morrow we go to the Opera at Paris ; as there is a very 
great desire that we should also go to the Comedie Fran9aise 
and the Comedie Italienne on two other days, I think that 
we shall probably do so. I appreciate more fully every day 
all that my dear mamma has done for my welfare. I was the 
youngest of all, and she has treated me as if I were her first- 
born ; and my heart is filled to overflowing with most loving 
gratitude." 

At this time Marie-Antoinette seemed truly happy. 
There were, however, two circumstances which always cast a 
shadow upon her life, — the continued coolness of her hus- 
band, and the scandal caused by the shameful ascendency of 
Madame du Barry. But what could she do? As Maria 
Theresa wrote to the Comte de Mercy, " Van Swieten [an 
old physician of Vienna] is of the opinion that if a young 
woman so attractive as the dauphine does not arouse the 
dauphin's affection, there is nothing to be done ; it is much 



The Daiiphine and Maria Theresa. 187 

better to make up our minds to wait patiently until time 
brings about a change in his conduct." 

With regard to Madame du Barry, there was no course 
but to submit to the inevitable. Her favor, incompre- 
hensible as it was, was destined to last out the life of 
Louis XV. 



XI. 

THE PAVILION OF LUCIENNES. 

MADAME DU BARRY was enthroned like a legitimate 
queen. She had at last, when the whim seized her, 
succeeded in assuming the manners and speech of the 
grandes dames. Choosing her intimate associates among 
women of the highest rank, a Marechale de Luxembourg, a 
Duchesse d'Aiguillon, and a Marechale de Mirepoix, she 
received in her salons dukes and peers, ministers and am- 
bassadors. When Gustavus III., king of Sweden, visited the 
French court in 1771, he bestowed a very costly necklace 
upon the favorite's little dog. 

Madame du Barry's policy — assuming that a woman of 
her stamp can have a policy — was more dictatorial and more 
conservative than that of Madame de Pompadour. Madame 
du Barry did not lean upon the philosophical faction, and while 
she kept Louis constantly stirred up concerning the danger 
to be feared from the Parliament, she as constantly kept 
before him the example of those princes who, like Charles I., 
had weakly allowed blows to be aimed at their royal preroga- 
tives. She had purchased, for twenty-four thousand livres at 
Baron de Thiers' sale, a portrait of the unfortunate monarch 
by Van Dyck, and it was said that she remarked one day to 



The Pavilion of Luciennes. 189 

Louis, pointing to that picture : " France, do you see that ? 
If you allow your Parliament to go on, it will cut off your 
head, as the English Parliament did with Charles I." 

The thought of danger restored the old king to the vigor 
which insured his tranquillity for the remainder of his life. 
Parliament, as the result of its disputes with the Due 
d'Aiguillon, had assumed a very factious attitude. It had 
followed up a declaration that " its members, to their great 
sorrow, were not left with sufificient liberty of thought to 
decide questions involving the property, the lives, and the 
honor of the king's subjects," by refusing to fulfil its judicial 
functions. Louis XV. crushed this revolutionary movement 
in the bud. During the night of the 17th January, 1771, all 
the members of Parliament were arrested at their homes, and 
required to answer yes or no a royal command to resume 
their duties. Every one refused. They were thereupon 
declared to have forfeited their positions, and were sent 
into exile. 

A new Parliament, called the " Parliament Maupeou," 
from the name of the Chancellor who had advised the cotip 
d'etat, took the place of the old, and showed itself to be 
an entirely docile body. As M. Theophile Lavallee has 
remarked, " the parts of the governmental machine were so 
worm-eaten that at the least touch of the finger of one 
of Madame du Barry's courtiers it all crumbled away 
to dust." 

In the persons of the magistrates, the people could see 
nought but privileged officials who had been cast into utter 



I go The Last Years of Louis XV. 

discredit by the cases of Lalli, Calas, and La Barre. Mau- 
peou announced that justice would be administered without 
charge, that offices would cease to be hereditary, and that a 
new code of procedure, civil and criminal, would be prepared. 
Voltaire, always on the winning side, went into ecstasies over 
the glory to be ascribed to the Chancellor, the author of this 
master-stroke, and commemorated it in a bit of hyperbolical 
versifying : — 

" Oui, que Maupeou, tout seul, du dddale des lois, 
Ait pu retirer la couronne, 

Qu'il I'ait seul rapportee, aux palais de nos rois, 
Voila ce que j'ai vu, voila ce que m'etonne. 
J'avoue avec I'antiquite 
Que ses heros sont admirables ; 
Mais, pas malheur, ce sont des fables : 
Et c'est ici la verite." * 

Madame de Pompadour had overthrown the Jesuits : the 
Jansenists were maltreated by Madame du Barry. From 
the depths of his retreat at Ferney, Voltaire fawned upon 
the favorite with that refinement of adulation of which he 
had the monopoly. On the 20th June, 1773, he wrote her 
the following letter: — 

" M. de Laborde has told me that you commanded him to kiss 
me on both cheeks for you. 

* " Yes, Maupeou, quite unaided, has succeeded in rescuing the crown from 
the mazes of the law, and in bringing it back to the palace of our kings : I 
have myself witnessed the exploit, and I marvelled at it. I agree that the deeds 
of the heroes of antiquity were admirable, but unfortunately they were fabulous; 
whereas this is truth." 



The Pavilion of Luciennes. 191 

" Quoi ! deux baisers sur le fin de ma vie ! 
Quel passeport vous daignez m'envoyer ! 
Deux ! c'est trop d'un, adorable Egerie, 
Je serais mort de plaisir au premier. * 

He has shown me your portrait: do not be angry Madame, if I 
took the liberty of returning the two kisses to it. 

" Vous ne pouvez empecher cet hommage, 
Faible tribut de quiconque a des yeux. 
C'est aux mortels d'adorer votre image, 
L'original etait fait pour les dieux. f 

" I have heard several portions of M. de Laborde's ' Pandore,' and 
they seemed to me abundantly deserving of your patronage. Favor 
bestowed upon the fine arts is the only thing which can possibly add 
to the briUiancy of your renown. 

" Condescend to accept, Madame, the deep respect of an aged 
hermit, whose heart now knows no other emotion save that of 
gratitude." 

Public opinion was less severe upon the favorite than 
one would suppose. Her good fortune was forgiven 
because, as was commonly said, she was " a good creature," — 
because "she was at heart devoted to the people, and was 
susceptible of natural affection and regard for the ties of 
blood." Every fortnight she passed a day with her mother, 
whom she metamorphosed into the Marquise de Montrable, 

* " What ! two kisses, just at the end of my life ! what a passport [to the other 
world] you deign to send me ! But two ! That is one too many, adorable Egeria, 
for I should die of pleasure at the first." 

t " You cannot forbid that mark of adoration, the feeble tribute of any one 
who has eyes. It is for mortals to worship your counterfeit presentiment, for 
the original was designed for the gods." 



192 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

and whom she furnished with comfortable quarters at the 
Convent of St. EHsabeth, — a carriage, a country-house, 
and a little farm near Lonjumeau, called the " Maison 
Rouge." 

Madame de Pompadour, the personification of the bour- 
geoise parvenue, had stirred up all ranks of society against 
her. The Du Barry was less obnoxious, because she was less 
arrogant. Moreover, her triumph was in accord with the 
spirit of a time when, as Chateaubriand has it, " court and 
city, economists and encyclopedists, great lords and gentle- 
men, financiers and bourgeois, were all alike, as is proved by 
the memoirs they have left us." 

More and more weary of the rigid rules of etiquette, 
Louis XV. in his old age aspired to lead the life of a pri- 
vate gentleman, with liberty to love women and hunting 
and good cheer as long as possible. Everything magni- 
ficent was a bore: Versailles, in its vastness and majesty, 
was as odious as a prison to him. He much preferred to 
the sumptuous abode of Louis XIV. the little pavilion 
which was built, by his orders, in 1771, directly beside the 
chateau of ' Luciennes, and which was Madame du Barry's 
property. 

There are monuments which fitly symbolize the age 
in which they were constructed. This palace-boudoir, the 
shrine of an immoral divinity, was a wonderfully accurate 
representation of the last years of the reign of Louis XV. 
The architect Ledoux was the builder of this chef dceuvre, 
and the salojis were decorated by the pencils of Joseph 



The Pavilion of Luciennes. 193 

Vernet, Greuze, and Fragonard. Situated upon an eleva- 
tion which commanded a magnificent prospect, the square 
pavilion, with its five long windows on each side, resembled 
a chateau d'Alcine, or the dwelling-place of a siren. The 
eye was first caught by a peristyle of four columns in 
the Greek style, and a revel of children in bas relief. 
Upon entering, one found one's self in a vestibule which 
served as a dining-hall on great occasions. It is the apart- 
ment shown in the beautiful aquarelle of Moreau le Jeune, 
now owned by the Musee du Louvre. The walls were of 
white marble, and were onamented with the arms of Louis 
XV. and the favorite intertwined, and framed in gold. 
At one end of the vestibule was a gallery for the comtesse's 
musicians. This great hall opened into the salon carre, 
of which Fragonard painted the door-panels. On each 
side of this great salon was another smaller one ; in that 
to the right was a series of four paintings by Vien, repre- 
senting symbolically the story of Love in a young girl's 
heart ; in the other, which was furnished with many mir- 
rors, in which was reflected again and again a superb 
chimney-piece of lapis-lazuli in tripod shape, Briard had 
painted the ceiling with the allegory of Love in the 
country. 

When Louis XV. came to Luciennes, he had no other 
apartments than those of the comtesse, except a room for 
making his toilet. He was extremely careful about his 
personal appearance, and required a special apartment to 
repair, when necessary, slight disarrangements of his make- 

13 



194 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

up, and to receive an extra touch of powder when his hair 
had not enough. 

What a lovely, fascinating toy was this wonderful pavilion! 
Cornices, bas-reliefs, pilasters, specimens of the goldsmith's 
art, everything which met the eye was an artistic gem, even 
to the locks and window-fastenings. The very apotheosis 
of luxury ! Caprice and whim and fantasy given full play 
in the decoration: Chinese images, statuettes of Saxony 
porcelain, caskets of ebony and ivory, pieces of lacquer ware, 
screens covered with birds of paradise with gaudy plumage, 
cages filled with parrots, and aviaries made of gold or 
silver ware. 

Among these interesting curiosities were to be seen a 
little spaniel, white as snow, a Brazilian monkey, a flame- 
colored parroquet, and a young Bengalee child with dark 
copper-colored skin, bright black eyes, and extraordinary 
garb. This curious little fellow, a living toy, was Zamore, 
for whom the comtesse and the Prince de Conti had been 
the sponsors in baptism, and whom Louis XV. had amused 
himself by appointing governor of the pavilion of Luciennes 
by decree regularly countersigned by the Chancellor of 
France. The little negro's costume was changed as many 
times a day as if he were a doll. Sometimes he was dressed 
like a savage, with red feathers, parti-colored clothes, and a 
necklace of gold or coral beads. Again he wore a green 
frock-coat all bedizened with gold, and accompanied the 
running footman, who, in a coat of sky-blue cloth, brandished 
as he ran a magnificent cane with carved head. Again, he 



l^he Pavilion of Luciennes. 195 

would appear, in vest and hose of pink satin, at the brilliant 
evening parties, when the notes of violin, flute, and cornet 
were heard in the galleries of the vestibule, and when, amid 
the noble dames in their dazzling toilets and gentlemen in 
velvet coats, surrounded by flashing jewels, decorations, 
pyramids of flowers, and in the blaze of countless lights, 
the Comtesse du Barry shone resplendent. It was like a 
superbly set scene from an opera, the last word of voluptuous 
libertinism. 

But her coquettish and frisky person did not appear at 
its best in fine attire. She was even prettier and more capti- 
vating when she donned the half-feminine, half-masculine 
uniform of the queen's light horse. It was to her in this 
garb that Dorat, in his enthusiasm, addressed the following 
poetical effusion: — 

" Sur ton double portrait le spectateur perplexe, 
Charmante Du Barry, vent t'admirer partout; 
A ses yeux changes-tu de sexe, 
II ne fait que changer de gout. 
S'il te voit en femme, dans I'ame, 
D'etre homme il sent tout le plaisir ; 
Tu deviens homme, et d'etre femme, 
Soudain il sent tout le desir." * 

At Luciennes, Louis lived like one of the kings of 
finance in his little establishment. The Most Christian 

* " In thy twofold guise, lovely Du Barry, the perplexed spectator knows not 
where to bestow his admiration; as often as thou changest thy sex, his fancy 
changes. If he sees thee in woman's garb, he feels in his soul all the advantage 
of being a man; thou becomest a man thyself, and he forthwith longs to be a 
woman. 



196 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

King laid his majesty aside there. He wore a plain white 
coat, and amused himself, like any good citizen, in playing 
at gardening a little. He liked to walk about under his 
lindens, and then take a seat upon the terrace, where he 
could look down upon the river which lay at his feet, and 
which wound about the hill in a horseshoe curve. On the 
horizon he could see St. Germain, where Louis XIV. was 
rocked in his cradle, and St. Denis, his last resting-place, — 
St. Denis, where he too must soon go to join his ancestors ; 
and far away, vaguely seen in the hazy distance, Paris, the 
malcontent and revolutionary town, which seemed always to 
menace his tranquillity. Upon that terrace Louis XV., 
wearied to distraction of Versailles, breathed the free air of 
heaven, and tried to forget, — to forget the mistakes of his 
diplomatic policy, official and secret; to forget the first 
partition of Poland, which was on the point of accomplish- 
ment, and the stern commands of England, which power, 
while preventing France from bearing aid to the Swedes and 
Poles, forbade her to send a fleet either to the Baltic or the 
Mediterranean ; to forget his own declining years, and the 
equally deplorable decline of the French monarchy. The 
worn-out sovereign looked at the present with eyes from 
which the scales of enchantment had fallen, and the glance 
with which he surveyed the future was full of anxiety. But 
let the Comtesse du Barry draw near, with her saucy face 
and her provoking smile, and her red lips which ask to be 
kissed, — for the moment the wrinkles are smoothed from 
Louis' brow. 



The Pavilion of Luciennes.. 197 

Was Madame du Barry really lower in the scale of 
morality than Madame de Pompadour? We do not think 
so. Was her influence more harmful to France ? We do 
not think that it was. Was the source of the favor of the 
marquise more worthy of respect than that from which the 
comtesse derived her power ? Was more real affection and 
more unselfishness exhibited by the first than by the second .'' 
For my own part, I can hardly distinguish between them. I 
should be inclined, however, to consider Madame de Pom- 
padour the more guilty of the two. Her husband was a 
much more estimable man than Comte Guillaume du Barry. 
M. Lenormand d'Etioles did not, like M. du Barry, make 
a shameful bargain, under the name of a marriage ; he 
loved his wife, and surrounded her with proofs of his devo- 
tion and respect. He did absolutely nothing to justify her 
shameful desertion of him, or the unexpected treachery 
of which he was the victim. 

M. du Barry, on the contrary, selected his lot for himself. 
Whatever people may have said, the marquise was really 
no greater lady than the comtesse. We remember that the 
aristocracy looked upon her as a bourgeoise. D'Argenson 
treated her as a strumpet, and Richelieu could see in her 
nothing but a plaything out of her sphere, " one who was 
not fitted to live worthily at court." Voltaire, her flatterer 
in ordinary, described her as a grisette born to shine at the 
opera or in the seraglio. 

The Pompadour was sufificiently refined, and the Du 
Barry was not less so. Both succeeded in acquiring the 



1 98 The Last Years of Louis X V. 

language of the court, and in carrying off a grand toilet as 
successfully as ladies of the very highest rank. D'Aiguillon, 
the favorite of the comtesse, was of as ancient a family as 
Choiseul, whom the marquise protected. They were both 
equally successful in securing a place for their families 
among the aristocracy. Madame de Pompadour's trans- 
formation of her brother, Abel Poisson, into the Marquis 
de Marigny, was matched by Madame du Barry's marriage 
of her nephew, Vicomte Adolphe du Barry, to a daughter 
of the Marquis de Tournon, who was a connection of the 
Soubise and Conde families. The comtesse had the ad- 
vantage of the marquise in that she could not be held 
responsible for any war, or for injudicious selection of 
generals. 

Evil passions — hatred and malice, ambition and avarice, 
the spirit of domination and overbearing pride — were infi- 
nitely more active in the heart of Madame de Pompadour 
than in Madame du Barry's. The former was an intriguing, 
plotting, mercenary woman, thoroughly self-poised, selfish, 
arrogant, and revengeful. The other was a child of the 
common people, entirely without virtue, but equally free 
from malice ; without high principle, but with no inclination 
to wickedness for the sake of doing evil; possessed of all 
the failings of the race of courtesans, but with all their 
thoughtlessness, prodigality, and gayety. 

Therefore in the galaxy of the women of Versailles I 
unhesitatingly place Madame du Barry above Madame de 
Pompadour, because she had, if all her contemporaries are 



The Pavilion of Luciennes. 199 

to be believed, one quality which was lacking in the mar- 
quise, — a quality which atones for many obliquities and 
many vices, and without which no woman, whoever she 
may be, can touch a sympthetic chord : that quality is 
kindness of heart. 



XII. 

DEATH OF LOUIS XV. 

LOUIS XV. had a foreboding that his end was near. 
Like all men who continue to lead a dissipated life 
when their hair has grown gray, he experienced more suf- 
fering than pleasure, more melancholy than joy, in his 
debauchery. Expiating a few brief moments of apocryphal 
enjoyment by long hours of ennui and discouragement, he 
felt the sharp pangs of fatigue, the remorse of the body; 
and of remorse, the fatigue of the soul. 

On the i6th June, 1773, the Comte de Mercy-Argenteau 
wrote to Maria Theresa : " Although the king's health has 
not grown visibly worse the past month, it is noticeable that 
he is daily more subject to despondency and eniiui. His 
original caprice for the favorite being weakened by lapse of 
time, and the woman having no means of attracting him in 
the infinitely slender resources of her intellect and her 
character, the king derives only the most moderate pleasure 
from her society now." 

In the course of his correspondence with his sovereign, 
the ambassador frequently recurs to Louis' incurable de- 
pression. On the 14th August, 1773, he wrote: "The king 
is growing old, and seems from time to time to have strange 



Death of Louis XV. 201 

fancies. He is quite alone, with no comfort from his 
children, and no zeal or attachment or fidelity on the part 
of the motley assemblage which constitutes his ministry, 
his social circle, and his surroundings generally." 

Again he wrote, February 19, 1774: "The king begins 
to talk now and then about his age and the condition of his 
health, and the frightful account he will have to settle some 
day with the Supreme Being of the use he has made of the 
time accorded him on earth. These reflections, occasioned 
by the recent decease of certain persons of about his age, 
who died almost in his presence, have caused considerable 
alarm to those persons who are encouraging the monarch to 
persevere in his present vicious courses ; and each one of 
them is now on the watch for a safe place of shelter in 
possible contingencies." 

Comments were freely made upon the acts and words 
and the secret thoughts of the king, upon his feeble impulse 
to revert to religious practices, the growing frequency of his 
visits to his daughter Louise, the Carmelite, and the humble 
mien with which he had listened to the words of a coura- 
geous prelate, Monseigneur de Beauvais, Bishop of Senez, 
who addressed him thus, in a sermon preached before the 
whole court : " Solomon, sated with debauchery, and having 
exhausted every variety of pleasure which surrounds the 
throne, ended by seeking some new excitement in the vile 
haunts of public vice." 

Louis XV. was sixty-four years old. He was once more 
wavering, as he had often done in his youth, between vice 



202 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

and virtue, when he was stricken at Petit-Trianon, on the 
28th April, 1774, with a malady which immediately assumed 
alarming proportions. He was transported to Versailles ; 
and immediately there ensued an exhibition of what was 
well called " the stock-jobbing and bargaining with the 
king's conscience." 

The Aiguillonists and the Barriens, as the partisans of the 
favorite and the minister were termed, maintained that the 
attack was not serious, and would not listen to suggestions 
of the administration of the sacrament. The friends of 
the Due de Choiseul, on the other hand, demanded that 
the king should at once receive extreme unction, which 
should be the signal for his mistress to be sent away. 
Upon this point MM. de Goncourt judiciously observe: 
" It came about strangely enough, that the D'Aiguillon 
faction, the party of he Church and the Jesuits, were in 
league to prevent Louis from receiving communion, while 
the Choiseul faction, the party of the philosophes and scof- 
fers, were determined that it should be administered." 

The Aiguillonists were shivering with apprehension. 
The king's illness was extremely serious : it was small-pox of 
the most malignant type. If the old monarch died, it was 
the end of their power ; if he should recover, he would surely 
become religious. In either case, Madame du Barry would 
no longer be of any consequence. 

The courtiers, fearing contagion, did not go near the sick 
room except with great reluctance and fear. One of them, 
M. de Letorieres succumbed to the disease, simply from hav- 



Death of Louis XV. 203 

ing held the door half open and looked at the king for two 
minutes. Nearly fifty persons were taken ill from having 
passed through the gallery. Louis' daughters, Mesdames 
Adelaide, Victoire, and Sophie, at this crisis gave an 
admirable exhibition of courage and filial devotion. Al- 
though they had never had the small-pox, they heroically 
defied the dread scourge. While the dauphin and his 
brothers, Comtes de Provence and d'Artois, prudently kept 
away, the three princesses shut themselves up unhesitatingly 
in their father's deserted sick-room.* There they remained 
from the beginning of the illness until his death. 

The Archbishop of Paris, Monsigneur Christophe de 
Beaumont, visited the king upon the 2d of May. " Great 
precautions were taken," says the Baron de Besenval in his 
" Memoires ; " " as soon as the archbishop appeared, the 
Marechal de Richelieu was seen to leave the king's suite in 
great haste, and go to meet him in the Salle des Gardes ; t 
there he drew him aside, and they seated themselves upon a 
bench. The marechal spoke with great earnestness, and 
gesticulated vehemently; although his words could not be 
heard, it was easy to imagine that he was trying to divert the 
archbishop from the idea of the sacrament." 

The king did not come to any determination at once. 
Meanwhile the disease gained ground. In the bulletin of the 
2-3d May, the physicians used the word "delirium," — an 
outspoken avowal which angered the Due d'Aiguillon. 

* Salle No. 126 of M. de Soulie's "Notice du Mus^e." 
f No 120 of the Notice du Musee. 



204 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

In the evening of the 4th, Madame du Barry was ushered 
into the sick room. " Madame," said the king, " I am ill : I 
know what I must do. I have no desire to go through the 
Metz performance again : we must part. Go you to M. 
d'Aiguillon's house at Rueil. Be assured that I shall always 
retain the most affectionate regard for you." The following 
day, at three in the afternoon, the favorite left Versailles, 
never to return. 

Louis XV. was on his death-bed. In vain he besought 
his noble-hearted daughters to leave him ; for the first time 
in their lives they disobeyed him. The old king,' as Mercy- 
Argenteau wrote to the empress, gave " many signs of 
repentance and resignation." By a Christian death, he 
atoned for the scandals of his long life. During the night 
of the 5 -6th May, he asked for his confessor, the Abbe 
Mondou. He received absolution, and at daybreak of the 
6th he gave orders to have the sacraments brought to him. 
Witnessing the greatest impatience for their arrival, he sent 
M. de Beauvau many times to the window to see if the 
messenger of God was not on the way. At last the clergy 
approached with the sacraments. The dying king eagerly 
threw off the bed-clothing, and struggled to a kneeling 
posture, supporting himself against the head of the bed. 
When the doctors urged him to cover himself up again, 
" When my merciful God," said he, " confers upon such a 
miserable wretch as I the honor of coming to seek him, the 
very least that I can do is to receive him with all due 
respect." 



Death of Louis XV. 205 

After the communion, the Cardinal de la Roche-Aymon, 
first chaplain, read aloud the sovereign's apology to his 
people. " Although the king," the cardinal cried, " owes to 
none but God an account of his conduct, he declares that he 
is sorry that he has caused his subjects to blush for him." 
Thereupon the moribund muttered in a voice, shaken with 
suffering, " Say it again, Monsieur Chaplain ; say those 
words again." 

Let us confess that if Louis XV. did make a failure of 
his life, he at least had the merit of knowing how to die 
well. 

A lighted candle in the chamber of death, which was to 
be extinguished simultaneously with the king's life, was to 
give the signal for the measures necessary to be taken, 
and the orders to be given, when he had drawn his last 
breath. On the loth May, 1774, at two in the afternoon, 
the candle was extinguished. At once a great uproar, like 
the rumbling of thunder, shook the arches of Versailles. 
It was the mob of courtiers fleeing from the antechamber 
of the deceased to rush headlong to greet the new mon- 
arch. He who was henceforth to be called Louis XVL 
fell instinctively upon his knees, with his wife at his side. 
" O God," he cried, " guide and watch over us : we are 
too young to reign ! " At six in the evening the new 
king and queen set out for Choisy, and Versailles was 
nought but a desert. 

The Comte de Segur speaks thus, in his " Memoires," of 
that sudden solitude: " Dazzled from childhood by the 



2o6 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

brilliancy of the throne and the extent of the royal power, 
and having witnessed the apparent zeal, the simulated ardor, 
and the continual assiduity of the courtiers, and the unceas- 
ing adulation, which was like a sort of worship, the last illness 
and death of the king moved me to tears. What was my 
amazement, on hastening to Versailles, to find myself quite 
alone in the palace ; to observe on all sides, in the city and the 
gardens, general indifference at least, if not a sort of delight ! 
The setting sun was forgotten ; all the worship was trans- 
ferred to the newly risen luminary. Even before he was laid 
in the tomb, the old monarch was relegated to the ranks of 
his motionless and dumb predecessors. Thenceforth his 
reign was ancient history, and every one was engrossed with 
the future: the old courtiers thought of nothing but how 
they could best maintain their influence under the new reign, 
and the younger generation were bent upon supplanting 
them. The antidote of court prestige is a change of reign ; 
then the heart is laid bare, and illusions cease for the time : 
the dead king is nothing but a common mortal, and often 
even less than that. There is no event better calculated to 
teach a moral lesson and make the judicious reflect." 

Just as Louis XV. was in the agony of death, the Due 
de Liancourt noticed a valet of the wardrobe weeping. 
" What ! " said the duke, " are you weeping for your master } " 
" Oh, no ; I am weeping for my poor comrade, who has 
never had the small-pox, and is going to die of it." 

The king's body, hastily rolled up in the bed-clothes, was 
placed in a triple casket of oak and lead. Certain priests 



Death of Loins XV. 207 

were the only persons who were condemned to stay by the 
mortal remains of the wretched king, in the lighted chapel. 
On the 12th May, the casket was placed in a coach. 
In the words of the Baron de Besenval, " twenty pages, and 
fifty or more mounted grooms, carrying torches (neither the 
attendants nor the coach being in mourning), composed 
the entire funeral procession, which set off at a fast trot at 
eight in the evening, and reached St. Denis at eleven 
amid the jeers of the populace, who lined the road, and. 
under cover of the darkness, gave full vent to the pro- 
pensity for fooling, which is the dominant characteristic 
of the French nature. Nor did they confine themselves 
to that; for epitaphs, placards, and verses were scattered 
broadcast, all tending to vilify the memory of the late 
king." 

A letter written by the Comtesse de Bouffiers to Gus- 
tavus III. on the 20th July, 1774, indicates what was at that 
time the feeling of a part at least of the French nobility. 
" After his death," says the comtesse, referring to Louis XV., 
" he was deserted, as is commonly the case, and in a fashion 
even more horrible than usual, on account of the nature of 
his illness. He was buried very promptly ; his body passed 
through the Bois de Boulogne towards midnight on its way 
to St. Denis. ... As it passed along, derisive cries were 
heard. The people shouted ' Ta'iaut ! Tai'aut ! ' [Tally-ho !] 
as when a stag is sighted, and burlesqued absurdly the tone 
in which the king used to say it. If this report is true, it 
shows much hard-heartedness ; but no one on earth is more 



2o8 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

inhuman than indignant Frenchmen, and it must be ad- 
mitted that they never had more cause to be indignant. 
Never did a nation sensitive upon the point of honor, and 
a nobility naturally proud, receive a more open and less 
excusable insult than the late king inflicted upon us when 
we saw him, not content at sixty years with the scandal he 
had already caused by his mistresses and his harem, raise a 
creature of the lowest sort from the very scum, and from 
a life of infamy, to install her at court, admit her to sit at 
table with his family, make her the absolute mistress of 
favors and honors and rewards, of politics and laws, which 
she has overturned, — a catalogue of calamities which we 
can hardly hope to see repaired. One can but look upon 
this sudden demise, and the complete disbandment of that 
infamous troop, as a providential stroke." 

If the noble classes spoke thus, what should we expect 
to hear from the bourgeoisie and the Parisian populace, 
always so fault-finding and so biting in its jibes } Their 
feelings found vent in satirical verses after the style of the 
following : — 

"Te voila done, pauvre Louis, 
Dans un cercueil a Saint-Denis ! 
C'est la que la grandeur expire. 
Depuis longtemps, s'il faut le dire, 
Inhabile a donner la loi, 
Tu portais le vain nom de roi, 
Sous la tutelle, et sous I'empire 
Des tyrans qui rdgnaient peur toi. 



Death of Louis XV. 209 

Etais-tu bon? C'est un probleme 

Qu'on peut resoudre a peu de frais. 

Un bon prince ne fit jamais 

Le malheur d'un peuple qui I'aime, 

Et Ton ne peut appeler bon 

Un roi sans frein et sans raison, 

Qui ne vecut que pour lui-meme. 

Faible, timide, peu sincere, 
Et caressant plus que jamais 
Quiconque avait su te deplaire, 
Au moment que de ta colere 
II allait ressentir les traits: 
Voila, je crois, ton caractere. 
Ami des propos libertins, 
Buveur fameux et roi c61ebre 
Par la chasse et par les catins : 
Voila ton oraison funebre ! " * 

Oh, ye kings ! Was not Bossuet justified in sa3'ing 
that all your majesty is borrowed, and that, because you are 
seated on the throne, you are none the less seated beneath 

* " So there you are, poor Louis, in a coffin at St. Denis ! There grandeur 
must be laid aside. For a long time, if I must say it, being very awkward on the 
seat of government, you have simply borne the empty title of king, under the 
guidance and dominion of the tyrants who reigned in your stead. 

" Were you a good king ? That is a problem which can be solved at short 
notice. A good king never brings misery upon his subjects who love him, nor 
can one call him a good king who has no self-restraint or common-sense, and lives 
only for himself. 

"Weak, wavering, insincere, and lavishing marks of the greatest affection 
upon any one who had incurred your displeasure, just when he was about to feel 
the weight of it, — such, in my opinion, was your character. Fond of lewd talk, a 
famous tippler, and a king celebrated as a huntsman and a rake ■. there is a 
funeral oration for you " 

14 



2IO The Last Years of Louis XV. 

the mighty hand and supreme power of God? What 
reflections may we not make upon the emptiness of the 
grandeur of this world, the wretchedness of the life of 
courts, the recantations and baseness of flatterers, the 
shameless calculations of ambition and self-interest, and 
the foulness of the human heart ! What a lesson ! — the 
frightful, horrifying, repulsive death of this monarch, who 
had exhausted all the enjoyment and all the distraction to 
be secured by luxurious living and debauchery ! What a 
contrast between the flower-strewn boudoir, brilliantly lighted 
and filled with sweet perfume, and the coffin in which lay 
rotting that "something which has no name in our tongue"! 
What spectacle could be at once more forbidding and more 
instructive than the lamentable end of that prince who had 
once received the surname of Bien-Aime, the well-beloved ? 



EPILOGUE. 

THE PASSING OF MADAME DU BARRY. 

THE fatal year, 1793, has come. Nineteen years have 
passed since the death of Louis XV. But what 
changes those nineteen years have seen ! What awful 
revolutionary changes ! No more thrones or altars ; no more 
aristocracy. Versailles is a desert. In the gilded galleries 
beds for the wounded are placed, and flocks graze in the 
gardens. The fountains are dry, and grass is growing 
between the flagstones of the courtyard. The marble 
statues, the bronze groups, are overturned or mutilated. 
The greatest crime in all French history has been perpe- 
trated : the descendant of Saint Louis, the most Christian 
king, has left his head upon the scaffold. 

Amid all this chaos what has become of Madame du 
Barry ? Where must we look for that woman who did so 
much to help along the weakening of the monarchical prin- 
ciple, and thereby to bring on the final catastrophe .'' Since 
October, 1792, she has been in London. She is no emigre, 
properly speaking, and had come to a satisfactory under- 
standing with the ruling powers of the day, before going to 
England to prosecute those who committed the robbery at 
Luciennes. The culprits crossed the Channel, and Madame 
du Barry has gone in quest of them. 



212 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

But before we come to this pursuit, let us go back a little, 
and see what had been the favorite's career since the acces- 
sion of Louis XVI. Exiled at first to the abbey of the 
Bernardines de Pont-aux-Dames in the suburbs of Meaux, 
she had obtained leave, after a few months, to return to her 
dear pavilion of Luciennes. Her financial affairs, which 
were badly involved, on account of her immense debts, were 
almost put in order. She continued to live in great style, 
and with a considerable establishment. Many of her courtier 
friends had remained true to her; and although it would 
appear that her royal lover had had more than one successor, 
she retained a sort of worldly regard for his memory. For- 
eigners of distinction were anxious to be presented to the 
late king's mistress. 

When the Emperor Joseph II. came to pay a visit to 
his sister, Marie-Antoinette, he found his way to the pavilion 
of Luciennes, and walked in the garden with the Comtesse 
du Barry on his arm. 

In her last years the comtesse made the conquest of an 
accomplished gentleman, the Due de Cosse-Brissac. He was 
a fine specimen of the thoroughbred nobleman, brave to 
heroism, and exquisitely refined and courtly in manner. Not 
only did he take Madame du Barry seriously, but he mani- 
fested as much consideration and respect for her as if she 
had been of the most lofty rank. To enthusiastic admiration 
he added a most earnest and lasting affection. As MM. de 
Goncourt have well said, there was in this attachment of M. 
de Brissac such a complete surrender of himself, accom- 



The Passing of Madame du Barry. 213 

panied by such thoughtful and delicate attentions and such 
deep adoration, that it causes one's judgment to waver as to 
a woman who could make herself appear worthy of so noble 
a passion. 

Madame du Barry, still in the bloom of her beauty, believed 
that she was destined to end her days in happiness and peace, 
because she had disarmed her bitterest enemies by her sweet- 
ness and her kind and playful disposition. Luciennes was 
still a palace of delight. But the tempest was muttering in 
the distance, and the comtesse, improvident to the last, had 
reckoned without the tide of revolution, which was rising ever 
higher, and was to end by submerging everything. 

Madame du Barry did not abjure her allegiance to the 
court or the monarchy. The woman of the people remained 
a royalist, remembering that she was a countess, and had 
been the king's mistress. In 1789, the day after the " Days 
of October," she gave asylum to the body gardes du corps 
at Luciennes, and looked after their wounds with great 
solicitude. The queen thanked her for the courageous deed, 
and the ex-favorite wrote to the wife of Louis XV I. a letter, 
quoted in the Memoirs of the Comte d'Allonville, in which 
she thus expressed herself: " These wounded youths have 
no regret except that they could not die for a princess so 
deserving of universal homage as your Majesty. What I am 
able to do for the brave fellows is far beneath their deserts. 
I comfort them as best I can, and I look upon their wounds 
with respect, when I think, Madame, that your Majesty might 
not be living to-day but for their devotion. 



214 The Last Years of Lotiis XV. 

" Luciennes is yours, Madame ; for was it not your gener- 
ous heart which restored it to me ? All that I have comes 
to me from the royal family, and my gratitude is too great to 
allow me ever to forget it. The late king, with a presenti- 
ment of impending separation, forced me to accept from 
him a thousand articles of value before sending me away 
from him. I have had the honor already of placing these 
treasures at your disposal, in the time of the Notables ; once 
more I offer them to you, Madame, and most earnestly 
entreat your acceptance of them. You have so many ex- 
penses, and are so tireless in generous deeds ! " 

In 1 791 Madame du Barry passed a few days in the man- 
sion of the Due de Brissac at Paris. Thieves took advan- 
tage of her absence from Luciennes to break into the pavilion 
and steal the superb jewels which were in her chests. They 
transported their plunder across the Channel. 

The following year the Due de Brissac was murdered at 
Versailles. He left a will, wherein he said, speaking of his 
daughter and sole residuary legatee, Madame de Mortemart: 
" I earnestly commend to her a person who is very dear 
to me, and who may be brought to great suffering by the 
catastrophes of the time. My daughter will find a codicil 
containing my commands in this matter." 

The codicil contained a considerable legacy to Madame 
du Barry. " I beseech her," said the due, " to accept this 
feeble proof of my attachment and my gratitude, my indebt- 
edness to her being so much the greater in that I was the 
involuntary cause of the loss of her diamonds; and further- 



The Passing of Madame du Barry. 215 

more, even if she succeeds in recovering any of them from 
England, the value of those unrecovered, and the expense of 
the various journeys she has had to make in her search, and 
of the premiums she will have to pay, will amount to quite as 
much as this legacy. I beg my daughter to persuade her to 
accept it. My knowledge of my daughter's heart gives me full 
assurance that she will see my wishes in this regard punctu- 
ally executed, whatever burdens may be imposed upon her 
succession by my will and codicil, it being my desire that no 
other legacy shall be paid until this one is fully discharged." 

The theft of the jewels was destined to be fatal to 
Madame du Barry. She was imprudent enough, even in 
those days of jealousy and hatred, to attract public attention 
to her wealth by posting upon the blank walls of Luciennes 
and the neighborhood a placard, which read : " Two 
thousand louis reward ; diamonds and jewels lost." Then 
followed a full list of diamonds, pearls, emeralds, rubies, and 
sapphires. 

Covetousness pricked up its ears : the village of Luciennes 
had its club, and the report was circulated that the comtesse 
possessed treasures without number, that inestimable wealth 
was to be found in the pavilion, that it was the mine to which 
the royalists came to fill their pockets, and that the comtesse 
was to direct the counsels and provide funds for the 
reactionaries. 

M. Sardou has said, " When history takes to dramatic 
writing, it does it well." The real historical drama, which 
has no alloy of fiction, but adheres to truth throughout, has 



2i6 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

its contrasts, its catastrophe, and its climax. Above all is it 
certain to have its traitorous characters. You remember 
Zamore, the Bengalese boy, whom the sovereign of Luci- 
ennes held in her arms at the baptismal font, and whom 
she had laden with benefactions, — the little darkie who 
carried the parasol over her head, and whose inky visage 
formed a fine background for the snow-white skin of the 
gorgeous comtesse 1 Oh, well ! the little wretch was a 
traitor. Through his connection with the former major-domo 
of Madame du Barry, he became the comrade of one Greive, 
who thus described and signed himself : " Official defender of 
the brave sans-culottes of Luciennes, friend of Franklin and 
Marat, factionary and anarchist of the first rank, and the 
arch-enemy of despotism in two hemispheres for twenty years 
past." This odious gang followed the comtesse with the 
keenness of hatred. She was a prey which the tigers, who 
caught the smell of blood, soon found means to get their 
claws upon. Zamore had sworn that he would send his 
benefactress to the scaffold, and Zamore kept his word. 

Madame du Barry went to England four times in search 
of those who stole her jewels. Her last stay on that side of 
the Channel lasted four months and a half, — from the middle 
of October, 1792, to the early part of March, 1793. How 
was it that this woman, who was never remarkable for per- 
sonal bravery, conceived the fatal idea of returning to France } 
Was it that her fear that she might never again behold the 
hidden treasures in the pavilion of Luciennes was stronger 
than the dictates of prudence .f" Or was the victim drawn on 



The Passing of Madame dtc Barry. 217 

by inexplicable fatality, by the resistless fascination of the 
loadstone rock? 

She left London on the 3d March, 1793, landed at Calais 
on the 5th, was detained there waiting for new passports 
until the i8th, and reached Luciennes on the 19th. She 
found the doors of the pavilion sealed. Zamore and his 
accomplices, the infamous band of servants to whom Ma- 
dame du Barry had been so kind and gentle and generous, 
continued with infernal zeal their hateful denunciations. 

On the 2d June the Convention issued a decree in these 
words : " The constituted authorities throughout the Repub- 
lic will hold themselves in readiness to seize and place under 
arrest all persons notoriously suspected of incivism." 

Madame du Barry's persecutors assumed authority under 
this decree to arrest her. Once she was released, and rein- 
stated in her pavilion; but the hatred of her foes knew no 
discouragement. The wretches laid before the Convention 
an address, in which, speaking in the name of the " Brave 
sans-culottes of Luciennes," they demanded the arrest for 
good and all of a woman who, they said, " had succeeded 
by her great wealth and the blandishments which she had 
learned at the court of a weak and immoral tyrant, and in 
spite of her notoriously unpatriotic connections, in eluding 
the Declaration of the Rights of Man, and had made of her 
chateau the rallying point of tyrannical plots against Paris." 

The Convention applauded this absurd buncombe, and 
congratulated the commune of Luciennes upon its patriotic 
spirit. The die was cast, and Madame du Barry was doomed. 



2i8 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

On the 2 2d September, surrounded by gendarmes, she left 
the paviHon of Luciennes, which she was never to see again. 
She was transferred to the prison of Sainte-Pelagie, where 
she was confined in the cell which had been occupied by 
Marie-Antoinette. 

What gloomy presentiments, what terror, what sinister 
thoughts, must have been hers! In her lonely cell, she who 
was once the mistress of Louis XV. could muse upon the 
fate of the mortal remains of her royal lover. Some days 
earlier, on the loth August, the Convention had given 
orders for the execution of its decree for violating the 
sepulchres at St. Denis, — the same St. Denis which the 
favorite used to look upon from the terrace at Luciennes. 
They had exhumed " the former kings and queens, princes 
and princesses," had broken open the coffins, and melted 
down the lead. The body of Louis XV., with those of 
Louis XIV. and his predecessors, was tossed at random 
into a common trench. 

The Comtesse du Barry shuddered. Now her turn had 
come to die. On the 7th December, 1793, at nine in the 
morning, she appeared, trembling with terror, before the 
revolutionary tribunal. Fouquier-Tinville, as public pros- 
ecutor, opened the proceedings, and in his address gave full 
vent to what he called " the indignation of an honest man 
and a good patriot." He stormed and raved in that brutal, 
bombastic jargon, disgusting and absurd, of which that 
infamous epoch alone had the secret. He declared his 
unwillingness, "from very modesty, to lift the veil which 



The Passing of Madame du Barry. 219 

ought to hide forever the unspeakable vices of the court." 
The modesty of Fouquier-Tinville ! Heaven save the mark ! 

Several of the former retainers of Madame du Barry, 
Zamore at their head, were base enough to testify against 
her. The death penalty was imposed. The poor creature's 
cheek blanched, and her limbs shook. The gendarmes were 
obliged to hold her so that she might not fall. On the 
next day she was to take her place in the fatal tumbril, 
the " tomb of the living," as Barrere named it. 

Mad with fear, gasping for breath, the condemned passed 
a night of frantic agony. She racked her brain to devise 
some means of prolonging her life for a few hours, or even 
minutes. She said that she had secrets to reveal, that she 
would point out the hiding-places of all her jewelry and 
hidden treasure at Luciennes. The public prosecutor's 
proxy arrived. Like one who fears that she may forget 
something, she went over singly all the articles which she 
possessed, thinking that each additional word gave her a 
second more of life. But the executioner was awaiting her : 
she must go. 

It was the 8th December, 1 793. Fifty-three days before, 
another woman, a queen, had emerged from the same cell 
in the same prison, also on the way to meet her doom. 
The tumbril was foul : a plank to sit upon, and on the 
plank not even a wisp of straw. Behind the victim stood 
Sanson, the executioner, holding the ends of a thick cord, 
with which the arms of the condemned queen were fastened 
behind her back. A poor actress had loaned her a dress. 



2 20 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

so that she might present a decent appearance upon the 
scaffold. And yet, in this poor garb, amid the jeers and 
hooting of the mob, on a frosty morning in October, the 
daughter of the C^sars was more subHme, more noble and 
majestic, than upon the throne. Clothed in white, like a 
spectre, her face of a deathlike pallor, except for a touch 
of red upon the cheek-bones, bloodshot but tearless eyes, 
hair bleached by sorrow, she remained to the last calm, 
serene, and noble-hearted, gazing mildly and pityingly upon 
the infernal uproar by which she was surrounded. For a 
single instant only did her features betray emotion. As 
the tumbril passed through Rue Saint Honore, opposite the 
Oratoire, a baby in its mother's arms threw a kiss to the 
queen ; and at this greeting from an innocent child, Marie- 
Antoinette wept. 

Upon reaching Calvary, she gazed sadly upon that sacri- 
legious spot, the scene of her husband's execution, the 
accursed place where, twenty years earlier, had occurred the 
catastrophe which foreboded the evil to come. She turned 
her eyes towards the cemetery of La Madeleine, where the 
victims of that casualty were interred, and where her own 
headless body was soon to be laid. Then she cast a last 
glance upon the Tuileries, which had held so much misery 
for her, — the Tuileries, her first place of confinement; and 
as she looked, she accidentally trod upon the executioner's 
foot, and said, with queenly courtesy : " I beg your pardon. 
Monsieur." She died ; but it was a hero's, a martyr's death. 
She died ; but her blood wrapped her in a new royal cloak, 



The Passing of Madame du Barry. 221 

and her severed head was encircled with a halo of glory 
which will glow from generation to generation. She died ; 
but the pure and radiant angels bore her white soul to 
heaven ! 

Madame du Barry did herself no more than justice. She 
felt that it was not in her power to meet death as nobly as her 
royal mistress had met it. In her case it was not the pass- 
ing of a saint to heaven, but the expiation of a sinner. The 
wife of Louis XVI. looked death calmly in the face; but the 
mistress of Louis XV. had not the courage to do the same. 
She was terrified, she sobbed, and uttered such heartrending 
shrieks that even the pitiless Terror itself was touched for the 
first time. As the cart passed in front of the Palais-Royal, 
the victim noticed the balcony of a milliner's shop where 
several of the women were watching the ghastly procession. 
She recosfnized the house, — it was the same in which, as a 
young girl, she had worked as a milliner's apprentice. Alas ! 
why had she ever become Madame la Comtesse du Barry? 

Her face was by turns deathly pale and deeply flushed. 
She struggled wildly with the executioner and his two 
assistants, who could with difificulty keep her on the seat. 
Her shrieks redoubled in force. " Life ! life ! " she cried ; 
"give me my life, and I will give all my estate to the 
nation!" Thereupon a man in the crowd retorted, "That 
would be giving the nation only what already belongs to 
it, for the tribunal has confiscated your property." A coal- 
heaver, standing in front of the speaker, turned and struck 
him. The victim renewed her entreaties. " My friends," 



222 The Last Years of Lotus XV 

she cried, "my friends, I have never harmed a soul! In 
Heaven's name I implore you to save me!" 

Who can say ? Perhaps the knitting-women themselves, 
the furies who licked the blood from the guillotine, might 
have been moved by these pitiful appeals from the woman of 
the people. This time it was not a queen who was about to 
die; it was a countess, but a countess who had been a work- 
woman. The horses were urged on, and the denouement 
accelerated, to put an end to the sympathy of the mob. 

At last the tumbril arrived upon the place, formerly 
called Place Louis XV. On the spot where the statue of 
the monarch used to stand, stood the scaffold on which his 
mistress was to die. It was half after four, " Help I " she 
shrieked ; " help ! mercy, mercy, Monsieur the executioner, 
one moment — " The knife fell, and Madame du Barry had 
ceased to live. 

Were we not justified in saying, as we did at the begin- 
ning of this study, that history is one long funeral oration ? 
Ah, there are tears in all things, as Virgil hath it, and what- 
ever is mortal touches our soul ! 

"Sunt lacrymae rerum, et tnentem mortalia tangunt." 

If one confines his attention to the superficial aspect of 
an epoch, he remains unmoved and indifferent; but let him 
extend his investigations beneath the surface, make his way 
into men's souls, listen attentively to the voices from beyond 
the grave, to the lamentations and cries of agony issuing 



The Passi?zg of Madame du Barry. 223 

from the gulf of the past, and he finds himself the prey of 
unconquerable but helpful sadness. He learns, to use the 
words of Bourdaloue, " that all the grandeur of which the 
world boasts, and upon which the pride of men feeds ; that 
the illustrious birth in which mortals take pride, the influence 
which they assume to possess, the authority which they plume 
themselves on, the success which they boast, the dignities 
and honors in which they find their profit, and the beauty, 
the valor, and the reputation which they idolize, — that all is 
but a lie." 

The lessons which history teaches are no less instructive 
nor less eloquent than the best sermons of the finest preach- 
ers. Every man's destiny has its moral, and no man dies 
that there is not a lesson to be drawn from his death. It is 
as if one were encompassed by a multitude of phantoms, 
pale some, and others bleeding, whose tomb-like appearance 
makes one tremble, and who say in their sepulchral accent : 
" O man, remember that thou art dust, and to dust shalt 
thou return." " Memento, homo, quia pulvis es, et in pul- 
verem reverteris." 

There they stand, these women of Louis XV. 's court, 
those royal mistresses, once so fawned upon, who appear once 
more, and for the last time, and say to us in turn a last word. 

" I," — it is the Comtesse de Mailly who speaks, — " when 
I was cast off by an earthly king, found comfort at the feet 
of the King of Heaven. I bitterly and sincerely grieved 
for my sins, and God in his mercy vouchsafed to give 
me time to repent." 



2 24 '^^^ Last Years of Louis XV. 

" I," says the Comtesse de Vintimille, "had barely crossed 
the threshold of the accursed palace of Versailles, when I 
was struck down as by a thunder-bolt, and died in giving 
birth to the child of my sin." 

" And I too," says the Duchesse de Chateauroux, "passed 
away like the grass of the field, between sunrise and sunset. 
Broken by insult and suffering, I lost my wretched sceptre ; 
and just as I was on the point of assuming it again, I died, 
in the flower of my youth, and shrouded in my shameful 
triumph as in the most sombre of grave-clothes." 

" In my twenty years of power," says the Marquise de 
Pompadour, " I did not for one single moment know what 
true happiness was. I had everything except esteem, which 
cannot be bought. Beneath my scheming and my suppo- 
sititious pleasures, I found nothing but emptiness. My 
conscience spoke louder than my flatterers, and I realized my 
own wretched condition. My life, so brilliant on the surface, 
was filled with gloom and sadness within. As a sorceress 
had foretold, I died of disappointment pure and simple." 

" I," says the Comtesse du Barry, the last of the royal 
mistresses, whose punishment was in a measure a summing 
up of all the atonements, — " I paid dearly for the sweets of 
luxury and debauchery; I knew not how to live or to die. 
At a time when heroism had become common, I was weak 
and cowardly, and trembled like a leaf upon the scaffold ! " 

We have listened to the favorites, and it is now the turn 
of the monarch whose shameful passion was the source of 
all their woes. What says he.? " Like the Ecclesiast, I have 



The Passing of Madame du Barry, 225 

seen everything under the sun, and have found that all was 
vanity and vexation of spirit. I voluntarily became the 
victim of guilty passions, which, when the brief period of 
intoxication was past, left in the mind only grievous torpor 
and a deeply felt void. I became disgusted with others and 
with myself ; I ceased to believe in the prestige of my own 
crown, and despite my wealth and power, and my ability to 
gratify all my whims, I became the very incarnation of that 
corroding disease, ennui. If my weakness occasioned scan- 
dal, bitter was my chastisement. I have been punished in 
my own person and in my family, — punished as man and 
as king." 

When we study these lessons of history and of death in 
the solitude of our hearts and minds, we may well reflect, 
and upon reflection may esteem the problems of human 
destiny less insoluble than they now seem ; and when we 
reach the point from which such matters should be regarded, 
we shall discover, as Bossuet says, that that which seems 
at first to be hopeless confusion, is in fact a perfect system, 
hidden, to be sure, but of combinations admirably ordained 
by Providence. Then worldly greatness will appear in its 
true light, and we shall be conscious of feeling more tranquil, 
less ambitious, and less inclined to complain of the unequal 
dispensations of fate. The shades of princes and princesses, 
of great lords and ladies, have a mysterious language of their 
own, and all unite in repeating these words from the " Imita- 
tion of Jesus Christ," the' most touching and saintly of all 
books except the Holy Gospel: — 

■5 



226 The Last Years of Louis XV. 

" It is vanity to do nought but amass wealth, and build one's 
hopes thereon. 

" It is vanity to do nought but strive after worldly honors, and 
to raise oneself to the highest posts. 

" It IS vanity to follow only the desires of the flesh, and to love 
that which will cause severe punishment to be visited upon us 
hereafter. 

" It is vanity to sigh for long life, and to take so little care to live 
an honorable one. 

" It is vanity to think only of the present, and not prepare for 
the future. 

"It is vanity to love only that which passeth so quickly away, 
and not to strive with all our might to win a home in heaven, where 
joy will endure forever." 



INDEX. 



Adelaide, daughter of Louis XV., S3 ; letter 
to Madame Louise, 115. 

Aiguillon, Due d', urges Madame du Barry to 
oppose tlie Due de Choiseul, 109. 

Aiguillon, Duchesse d', companionsliip with 
Madame du Barry, 169; intimate associate 
of Madame du Barry, iSS. 

Aix, Archbishop of, faithful friend of Made- 
moiselle de Lespinasse, 65. 

Alais, Bishop of, divides society into two 
classes, 19. 

Albon, Comtesse d'. Mademoiselle de Lespi- 
nasse the illegitimate daughter of, 64. 

Alembert d', court paid to, 15 ; first place in 
public esteem belongs to, 53; a foundling, 
53 ; dares to defy the Marquise du Deffand, 
64; in love with Mademoiselle de Lespi- 
nasse, 64. 

Alsace, overflowing with joy, 136. 

Ange, Mademoiselle d', appellation given 
Madame du Barry by Comte Jean du 
Barry, 97. 

Anglomania, foes of, 14. 

Anne of Austria, dislike of Louis XIIL for, 
151. 

Antifacomiiers, 49. 

Areopagus, the salon of Marquise du Deffand 
an, 62. 

Argenson, Marquis d', Louis' minister for 
Foreign Affairs, 24 ; wretched fruits of 
absolute monarchy, 25; wretched condition 
of the people, 35. 

Armaille', Comtesse d', beauty of Marie- 
Antoinette, 125. 

Art, women the acknowledged arbiters of, at 
Paris, 41. 



Artois, Comte d', 155; the beau idlal of 
society men, 184. 

Artois, Comtesse d', contrast between Marie- 
Antoinette and, 182. 

•' Athalie," performance of, 147. 

Atheism, intended only for a few thinkers, 
74 ; a wretched dish, 75. 

Aubertin, M. Charles, " L'Esprit public du 
Dix-huitieme Siecle," 33. 

Auguste, Madame, dancer from the Opera, 58. 

Auteuil, church of St. Laurent at, 98. 

Ayen, Due d', 116. 

Bachaumont, preaching h la grecque, 19 ; 
inveighing against decrees, 23 ; rage for 
arguments on finance and government, 71; 
letter about Voltaire, 74 ; draws portrait of 
Marie-Antoinette, 141. 

" Barbier de Se'ville," 26. 

Barbier, journal of, 71. 

Barry, Comte Guillaume du, becomes the 
nominal husband of Madame du Barry, 98; 
compared with M. Lenormand d'EtioIes, 
197 

Barry, Comtesse du, triumph of, 2; speech in 
boudoir of, 1; ; passion of Louis XV. for, 
8; Louis XV the lover of, 12, overthrows 
the Jansenists, 26; chosen as sultana of 
harem of the Parc-aux-Cerfs, 93 ; birth cer- 
tificate of, 94 ; true origin of, 96 ; daughter 
of a peasant mother, 96 ; early history of, 
96, 97 ; becomes the favorite of Louis XV., 
97; presented by the Comtesse de Beam, 
103; triumph of, 103, 104; non-approval of 
the Marechal de Richelieu, 105 ; Horace 
Walpole lukewarm towards, 106; urged 



228 



Index. 



to oppose the Due de Choiseul, 109; 
the scandal of the age, no; opposed by 
the Due de Choiseul, 163; amazed at her 
triumph over the Due de Choiseul, 167; 
unlimited ascendency over Louis XV., 16S; 
companionship with the Duchesse d'Aiguil- 
Ion, 169; civil bearing of Marie-Antoinette 
towards, 169; enthroned like a legitimate 
queen, iSS; intimate associates of, 18S; 
Gustavus III. bestows gift on dog of, 1S8 ; 
policy more dictatorial and more con- 
sevative than that of Madame de Pompa- 
dour, iSS; maltreats the Jansenists, 190; 
fawned upon by Voltaire, 190 ; letter from 
Voltaire, 190; provisions made for her 
mother by, 192; lines addressed by Dorat 
to, 195; compared with Madame de Pom- 
padour, 197 ; placed above Madame de 
Pompadour, igS ; parting with Louis XV , 
204 ; exiled to abbey of the Bernardines de 
Pont-aux-Dames, 212; conquest over the 
Due de Cosse-Brissac, 212 ; letter to Marie- 
Antoinette, 213; bequest from the Due de 
Cosse-Brissac, 214; betrayed by Zamore, 
216 ; arrested, 217 ; sent to prison of Sainte- 
Pelagie, 21S; condemned to death, 219; 
terror at execution, 221 ; death of, 222 , 
last word of, 224. 

Barry du, Comte Jean, seducer of Madame 
du Barry when a young girl, 97. 

Barry, Vicomte Adolphe du, married to a 
daughter of the Marquis de Tournon, 19S. 

Barrere, " the tomb of the living," 219. 

Barthelemy, M. Edouard de, 114. 

Baschet, M Armand, 151. 

Bautin, M., letter from Madame Geoffrin, 
124. 

Bavi^re, Dauphine de, 155. 

Beam, Comtesse de, presents Madame du 
Barry, 103. 

Beaumarchais, affair against the Counsellor 
Goezman, 26; the cynosure of every eye, 
27 ; ndiveti of, 27 ; trusted with secret mis- 
sion to England, 29. 

Beaumont, Monseigneur Christophe de, Arch 
bishop of Paris, 112; visit to Louis XV., 
203. 

Beauvais, Abbe de, censures libertines, 20; 
Bishop of Senez, 201. 

P.eauvau, Madame de, defies the king, 10 

Becu, Anne, mother of Madame du Barry, 94. 



Becu, Jeanne, true name of Madame du 
Barry, 96. 

Belley, Bishop of, 75. 

Benedict XIV., Pope, description of the Due 
de Choiseul, 92. 

Bernardines de Pont-aux-Dames, abbey of, 
Madame du Barry exiled to, 212 

Besenval, Baron de, 45 ; lack of conjugal love 
destructive of good morals, 46 ; visit of 
Monseigneur Christophe de Beaumont to 
Louis XV., 203 ; burial of Louis XV., 207. 

Birabin, Jeanne de, godmother of Madame 
du Barry, 95. 

Blot, Comtesse de, power of Rousseau's pas- 
sion, 51 

Boileau, 63 

Boismont, Abbe de, faithful friend of Made- 
moiselle de Lespinasse, 65. 

Bonhorame, M Honore, grief of Madame 
Louise for Louis XV., 112. 

Bontaric, M. de, picture of Louis XV., 85. 

Bossuet, the majesty of kings borrowed, 209. 

Boufflers, Due de, first husband of the Mare- 
chale de Luxembourg, 54. 

Boufflers, Madame de, correspondence with 
Gustavus III., king of Sweden, 42,44, 207; 
idol of the Temple, 58. 

" Bourbonnaise," chanson of the, 99. 

Bourdaloue, 223. 

Bourgeoisie, tremendous gulf between nobles 
and, 15; better than the nobility, 30. 

Bourgogne, Duchesse de, 155. 

Breteuil, Baron de, ambassador to .Sweden, 86. 

Broglie, Comte de, leader of the " backstairs " 
diplomatic body, 86 ; despatches of the 
diplomats in secret sent to, 86; continues 
to superintend after exile, 86. 

Buffon, definition of love, 48. 

Burg, the, Marie-Antoinette still the little 
scholar of, 173. 

Calas, sent to the wheel, 22, igo. 

Campan, Madame, Mademoiselle Genet the 
future, 81; memoirs of, 88, 89; account 
of Madame Louise, iii; visits Madame 
Louise at Convent of St. Denis, 115. 

Capuchin, 66. 

Carmel, Mount, order of, 19, 

Catherine II., Czarina, writes affectionate 
letters to Madame Geoffrin, 60 ; admiration 
of Diderot for, 74. 



Index. 



229 



Celadons, gray-haired, 11. 

Chambord, Comte de, 119. 

Chamfort, definition of love, 47. 

Chanteloup, pillar at, 3; in vogue, 10; place 
of exile of Due de Choiseul, 10; the Due 
de Choiseul exiled to, 165. 

Chantilly, crowded, 10 ; seat of Due d'Orleans 
and Prince de Conde, 10. 

Charles V., 117. 

Chartres, Bishop of, first chaplain to Marie- 
Antoinette, 134. 

Chartres, Due de, 2S ; assumes the name of 
" Philippe figalite," 166. 

Chartres, Duchesse de, 51. 

Chartreuse, the, the Carthusian convent. Rue 
d'Enfer, 77 ; Walpole seeks asylum at, 77. 

Chastellux, Chevalier de, faithful friend of 
Mademoiselle de Lespinasse, 65. 

Chateaubriand, changes of the times, 90. 

Chateauroux, Duchesse de, loi ; last word 
of, 224. 

Chicaneau, 2S. 

Choiseul, Due de, falls from power, 3; Chan- 
teloup the place of exile of, 10; impulsive, 
voluble, and good-humored, 91 ; a follower 
of Voltaire, 91; his character opposite 
to that of Louis XV., 91 ; Baron de 
Gleichen's opinion of, 92 ; Pope Benedict 
XIV. 's description of, 92 ; Madame du 
Barry urged to oppose, 109; welcomes 
Marie-Antoinette, 13S; imprudent in his 
actions, 161 ; letters from Louis XV., 162, 
165; imprudence of, 161, 162; opposition 
to Madame du Barry, 163 ; opinion of 
Jobez of, 163; turning fortunes of, 164, 
sent into exile, 165; friendship of the court 
for, 166; Marie-Antoinette indignant, and 
Maria Theresa alarmed at fall of, 167. 

Choiseul, Duchesse de, clever and virtuous, 
56; her salon an aristocratic and intellec- 
tual centre of the first order, 56, 59; not 
disturbed by the sarcasms of Voltaire, nor 
the diatribes of Rousseau, 56; letter about 
Rousseau, 57 ; honorable, beautiful, true, 
58; not always pretty, 58; Walpole's des- 
cription of, 58. 

Church, in state of decay, 21 ; opposition 
against, 25 ; prelates sapping the under- 
pinning of, 30. 

Clement XIV., Pope, 115. 

Clergy, body of, 17. 



Clotilde, Madame, 155. 

Colle, women have the upper hand among 
Frenchmen, 41. 

Comedie Francaise, 186. 

Comedie Italienne, 1S6. 

Compiegne, abandoned, 10. 

Conches, M. Feuillet de, early life of Marie- 
Antoinette, 124. 

Conde, Prince de, Villers-Cotterets and Chan- 
tilly the seats of, 10. 

Conti, Prince de, 28. 

Constantinople, Comte Desalleurs ambas- 
sador at, 86. 

Corneille, heroines of, 51. 

Corsica, annexed to France, 11. 

Cosse-Brissac, Due de, legacy of, 94 ; conquest 
of Madame du Barry over, 212; murder of, 
214; bequest to Madame du Barry, 214. 

Cosse, Duchesse de, dame d'atoiirs to Marie- 
Antoinette, 133. 

Crebillon Jils, 48. 

Croy, Madame de, correspondence with 
Gustavus III., king of Sweden, 42. 

Cythera's isle, 51. 

Cythera, veterans of, i:. 

Dangeau, no successor found to, g. 

Dauphin of France, marriage of Marie- 
Antoinette by proxy to, 127; letter from 
Marie-Antoinette, 127, 128. 

Dauphine of France, sec Marie-Antoinette. 

Deffand, Marquise de, salon of, 3, 59 ; a mere 
machine, 5 ; her salon the principal rival 
of that of Madame Geoffrin, 62; as well- 
informed as Madame Geoffrin is ignorant, 
62 ; a power to be reckoned with, 62 ; her 
salon a centre of intelligence, 63 ; " the 
female Voltaire," 64 ; the incarnation of 
the eighteenth century, 64 ; feared by Vol- 
taire, 64 ; Mademoiselle de Lespinasse 
the deadly foe of, 64; Mademoiselle de 
Lespinasse first finds shelter with, 64 ; 
rupture with Mademoiselle de Lespinasse, 
65 ; yearning for religion, 67 ; letter to 
Voltaire, 68; falls in love with Horace 
Walpole, 69 ; letters to Horace Walpole, 
105, 107, 143. 

De Luynes, no successor found to, 10. 

Demange, Joseph, see Mange, Joseph de. 

Desalleurs. Comte, ambassador at Constan- 
tinople, 86. 



230 



Index. 



Diderot, century of, 6; court paid to, 15; 
admirers of, 36; opinion of atheism, 74; 
admiration for Empress Catlierine II., 74. 

Dillon, type of the new France, 184. 

Dorat, addresses lines to Madame du Barry, 
195. 

Drohojowska, Comtesse de, 119. 

Dufresne, Marie-Antoinette reads tragedies of 
Racine and fables of La Fontaine with, 124. 

Dumonceau, M., provides for Madame du 
Barry when a child, 96. 

Dumouriez, 97. 

Durfort, Marquis de, requests hand of Marie- 
Antoinette for the dauphin of France, 127. 

fioALiTE, Philippe, assumed name of the 

Due de Chartres, 166. 
Egmont, Madame d', correspondence with 

Gustavus III., king of Sweden, 42, 43 ; 

beautiful and clever, 43. 
Elisabeth, Madame, the martyred saint, 155. 
Encyclopedie, a " Tower of Babel," 6 ; women 

the enemies of the, 41 ; Madame Geoffrin 

gives money to found the, 60. 
Encyclopedistes, work being done by, 66. 
Eon, Chevalier d', in secret diplomatic corps 

of Louis XV., 85. 
Epinay, Madame d', definitions of love, 48. 
Equality, begins to make its appearance, 15. 
Esterhazy, Prince, unceremonious calls of 

Maria Theresa upon, 122. 
Etiquette, a custom simply, 9. 
Etiquette, Madame, name bestowed upon the 

Comtesse de Noailles by Marie-Antoinette, 

175- 
Etioles, M. Lenormand d', compared with 
Comte Guillaume du Barry, 197. 

Falkland Islands, war in the, 164. 

Fashion, women the acknowledged arbiters 
of, at Paris, 41. 

Faubourg Saint-Germain, too much attention 
paid to mansions of the, 39. 

Ferrucci, Mademoiselle Rosa, 125. 

Florian, dedicates poem to the Due de Pen- 
thiere, 183. 

Fontenoy, Louis XV. victor of, 11. 

Fouquier-Tinville, public prosecutor of Ma- 
dame du Barry, 218. 

Fragonard, decorates pavilion of Luciennes, 
193- 



France, advanced civilization of, 3 ; nothing 
to impede irresistible movement in path of 
progress of, 4; Lorraine and Corsica an- 
nexed to, 1 1 ; three estates in, 24. 

Francis, Emperor, father of Marie-Antoinette, 
122; affection for Marie-Antoinette, 121, 
122; death of, 123. 

Franipois I., 89 ; resistance to concordat of, 91. 

Franklin, 216. 

French society, dancing toward the abyss, 2. 

Gabriel, designs new theatre at Versailles, 
143- 

Galerie des Glaces, courtiers waiting in, 9. 

Gallican Church, liberties of, 31. 

Galon, L., vicar of Vaucouleurs, 95. 

Gassner, the clairvoyant, 123, 

Genet, Mademoiselle, the future Madame 
Campan, Si ; impressed by gloom caused 
by death of Marie Leczinska, Si ; installed 
as reader to Mesdames de France, Si. 

Geoffrin, Madame, 3 ; salon of, 59 ; her power 
a characteristic sign of the time, 59 ; Stan- 
islas Poniatowski, king of Poland, a friend 
of, 60 ; Empress Maria Theresa pays, atten- 
tion to, 60 ; Czarina Catherine II. writes 
affectionate letters to, 60; loans money to 
found the " Encyclopedie," 60 ; her manner 
compared to style of La Fontaine, 61 ; 
Walpole's letter to Lady Hervey about, 61 ; 
the salon of the Marquise du Deffand the 
principal rival to that of, 62 ; as ignorant 
as Marquise du Deffand is well-informed, 
62; journey to Poland, 123; letter to M. 
Bautin, 124. 

Gevaudan, beast of, 7. 

Ghistelles, Princesse de, maid of honor to 
Madame Louise, 114. 

Gleichen, Baron de, Madame Geoffrin's man- 
ner compared to La Fontaine's style, 61 ; 
fable about elixir of life, 85 ; opinion of 
the Due de Choiseul, 92 ; considers the 
Due de Choiseul imprudent, 161, 162. 

Goethe, 122 ; presentation of Marie-Antoinette 
to the French, 134, 

Goezman, Counsellor, affair of Beaumarchais 
against, 26. 

Goezman, Madame, 27. 

Goftroy, M. A., "Gustave III. et la cour de 
France," 43. 

Golden Age, uncertain approach of, 5. 



Index. 



231 



Goncourt, MM. de, "L' Amour au XVIIIe. 
siecle," 49; relations of Louis XV. witli 
Madame du Barry, 103. 

Gontant, M. de, the State powerful, 24. 

Grasset, M., study of Madame de Choiseul, 
58. 

Greuze, decorates pavilion of Luciennes, 193. 

Guibert, M. de, Mademoiselle de Lespinasse 
falls in love with, 69. 

Guinard, a page, 86 

Guise, Due de, i6i. 

Gustavus III., king of Sweden, 42 ; corres- 
pondence with French ladies, 42-43 ; be- 
stows gift on dog of Madame du Barry, 
18S ; letter from the Comtesse de Boufflers 
to, 207. 

Hardy, Prosper, Memoirs of, 31. 

Helvetius, century of, 6 ; admirers of, 36. 

Henriette, Madame, the people sigh for, 88. 

Henri IV., 89. 

Hervey, Lady, letter from Walpole about 
Madame Geoff rin, to, 61. 

History, lessons taught by, 223. 

Holbach, Baron d', admirers of, 36 ; dinner- 
parties of, 77. 

Jansenists, overthrown by Madame du 
Barry, 26 ; disappearance of, 26 ; maltreated 
by Madame du Barry, 190. 

Jesuits, regret at expulsion of, 3 ; overthrown 
by Madame de Pompadour, 26 ; disappear- 
ance of the, 26; women the friends of 
the, 41. 

Jews, better Christians than Voltaire, 76. 

Jobez. M., opinion of the Due de Choiseul, 
163. 

Joseph II., Emperor, 212. 

Julie, Sister, instructs Madame Louise at St. 
Denis, i iS. See MacMahon, Julienne de. 

KiNSKY, Prince von, unceremonious calls of 
Maria Theresa upon, 122. 

La Barre, sent to the scaffold, 22, 190. 
Labille, Madame du Barry, when a young 

girl, in the employ of, 96. 
Labord, M. de, 190; "Pandore"of, 191. 
La Bruyere, wretched condition of the people, 

35; restrictions of a "Christian and a 

Frenchman," 71. 



Lafayette, type of the new France, 184. 

La Fontaine, Madame Geoffrin's manner 

compared to style of, 61. 
La Harpe, chosen as escort by Marechale de 

Luxembourg, 53. 
Lalli, 190. 

La Madeleine, cemetery of, 220. 
La Marck, Comte de, type of the new France, 

184; merciless in ridicuhng every one ugly 

or dull, 1S4. 
Lamath, type of the new France, 184. 
Lamballe, Princesse de, one of the most 

poetic and sympathetic souls of the age, 

183; devotion to the Due de Penthievre, 

183. 

Lavallee, M. Theophile, secret correspon- 
dence of Louis XV., 87 ; opinion of the 
" Parliament Maupeou," 189. 

La Roche-Aymon, Monseigneur de. Arch- 
bishop of Rheims and Grand Chaplain of 
France, 142. 

Larsonneur, arranges wardrobe of Marie- 
Antoinette, 124. 

Lauzun, Duc.de, the future Lovelace, 47; 
memoirs of, 47 ; follows Madame du Barry, 
97 ; type of the new France, 184. 

Lebel, valet-de-chambre of Louis XV., 97. 

Leczinska, Marie, death of, 2 ; grief at death 
of, Si ; devotion of Louis XV. during last 
illness of, S2. 

Ledoux, builds the pavilion of Luciennes, 192. 

Leopold, Archduke, marriage to a Spanish 
infanta, 122. 

Le Roi, M., custodian of library at Versailles, 
95. 

Le Roy, huntsman of Louis XV., 88 ; "a La 
Bruyere on horseback," 88. 

Lescure, M. de, rnonograph of, 63. 

Lespinasse, Mademoiselle de, 3 ; salon of, 59 ; 
deadly foe of the Marquise du Deffand, 
64; D'Alembert in love with,64; an ille- 
gitimate daughter of the Comtesse d'Albon, 
64; first finds shelter with the Marquise 
du Deffand, 64; rupture with the Mar- 
quise du Deffand, 65 ; futile love, 69. 

Lesueur, preferred by Walpole to all painters 
of his acquaintance, 77. 

Letorieres, M. de, 202. 

Liancourt, Due de, 206. 

Ligne, Prince de, definition of love, 47. 

Lisbon, terrible earthquake in, 121. 



23: 



Index. 



Literature, women the acknowledged arbiters 
of, at Paris, 41 ; fills too great a place in 
social intercourse, 53. 

Lord's Prayer, dedicated to Louis XV., 8. 

Lorraine, annexed to France, 11. 

Lorraine, Mademoiselle de, performs minuet 
at ne\v theatre at Versailles, 143 ; disturb- 
ance caused by minuet of, 143, 144. 

Louise, JVIadame, takes veil of Carmelite nun, 
2, 19; daughter of Louis XV., S3; the edi- 
fication of the age, no; pious life of, no, 
III ; grief for Louis XV., 112; applies for 
admission to the convent, 112; enters St. 
Denis, 114; letters from Louis XV., 113, 
114; letter from Madame Adelaide to, 115 ; 
letter from Madame Sophie to, 115; visit 
from Madame Campan at St. Denis, 115; 
visit from Marie-Antoinette at St. Denis, 
139; takes the veil, 157. 

Louis XIIL, dislike for Anne of Austria, 151. 

Louis XV. no longer the "Well-Beloved," 2; 
gazes uneasily at portrait of Charles I. of 
England, 4 ; "After me the deluge," 5 ; sees 
no good augury for future, 5 ; court out of 
fashion at close of reign of, S ; passion for 
Du Barry, 8 ; Versailles no longer trembled 
before, 8; satirically called the "Well- 
Beloved of the Almance," 8 ; Lord's Prayer 
dedicated to, 8; the "Tsar of the Gauls," 
10; a type of the old regime, 11 ; victor of 
Pontenoy, 11; to be pitied rather than 
blamed, 11; victory over Parliament, 12; 
the lover of Du Barry, 12 ; hatred rather 
than indifference towards, 12; skilled in the 
science of government, 13; death feared by 
Maria Theresa, 13 ; daughters of, 19 ; holds 
Parliamentarians in holy horror, 23 ; has 
not succeeded in governing tyrannically, 24 ; 
realizes need of striking a vigorous blow, 
25 ; believes himself more powerful than 
Louis XIV., 26; trusts Beaumarchais with 
secret mission to England, 29 ; crosses the 
Pont-Neuf, 33 ; too prone to forget the 
people, 39 ; ruled by women at Versailles, 
41 ; bereavements of, 82 ; devotion to 
Marie Leczinska during her last illness, 
82 ; dangerous condition of, 82 ; much 
attached to his four remaining daughters, 
83: dominating sentiment a mixture of 
apathy and heedlessness in heart of, 83 ; 
tottering power of, 84 ; M. de Bontaric's 



opinion of, 85; secret correspondence of. 
87; does not lack intelligence, 87; still 
beloved by his people, 88 ; sympathy of 
the Comte de Segur for, 89 , a shrewd and 
perspicacious observer, 91 ; his character 
opposite to that of the Due de Choiseul, 
91 ; Madame du Barry becomes the favor- 
ite of, 97; secret visits to the Parc-aux- 
Cerfs, 103 ; grief of Madame Louise for, 
112; gives consent for Madame Louise to 
enter the convent, 113; letters to Madame 
Louise, 113, 114; received Marie-Antoi- 
nette, 13S ; letter to the Due de Choiseul, 
162; timidity of, 164; sends the Due de 
Choiseul into exile, 165; unlimited ascend 
ency of Madame du Barry over, 168 ; sends 
members of Parliament into exile, 1S9 ; 
desires more seclusion in his old age, 
192 ; visit to the pavilion of Luciennes, 
193 ; freedom at the pavilion of Luciennes, 
196 ; failing health of, 200; stricken at Petit- 
Trianon, 202; devotion of his daughters to, 
203; parting with Madame du Barry, 204; 
death-bed of, 204 ; death of, 205 ; deserted 
at death, 205 ; burial of, 207 ; no respect 
felt for, 209, 210; last word of, 224, 225. 

Louis XVL, too young, 13 ; executed, 220. 

Love, conjugal, least common form during 
reign of Louis XV., 46; Chamfort's defi- 
nition of, 47 ; Prince de Ligne's definition 
of, 47; Buffon's definition of, 48; Madame 
d'Epinay's definition of, 48. 

Luciennes, chdteau of, given by Louis XV. 
to Madame du Barry, 104. 

Luciennes, Pavilion of, preferred by Louis 
XV. to sumptuous abode of Louis XVL, 
192; built by the architect Ledou.x, 192; 
decorated by Joseph Vernet, Greuze, and 
Fragonard, 193; location of, 193; descrip- 
tion of, 193; visit of Louis XV. to, 193; 
curiosities contained in, 194; Zamore ap- 
pointed governor of, 194; freedom of Louis 
XV. at, 196. 

Lulli, writes music for the opera " Persee," 

143- 
Luxembourg, Madame la Marechale de, cor- 
respondence with Gustavus TIL, king of 
Sweden, 42 ; chooses La Harpe for her 
escort, 53 ; Due de Boufiflers the first hus- 
band of, 54 ; hailed as the mother of Love, 
54 ; of great service to morals of republic. 



Index. 



233 



55; fascinates Rousseau, 55; conversation 
does not scintillate with wit, 55 ; salon an 
aristocratic centre, 59; intimate associate 
of Madame du Barry, 188. 

MacMahon, Julienne de, becomes " Sister 
Julie," at monastery of St. Denis, 118. 

Mailly, Comtesse de, last word of, 223. 

" Maison Rouge," house given by Madame du 
Barry to her mother, 192. 

Mange, Joseph de, godfather of Madame du 
Barry, 95. 

Marat, 216. 

Marck, Madame de la, correspondence with 
Gustavus III., king of Sweden, 42, 44. 

Maria Theresa, fears death of Louis XV., 
13; overwhelms Madame Geoffrin with at- 
tention, 60 ; a woman of genius and of 
heart, 121 ; ambition for Marie-Antoinette, 
124; sorrow at parting from Marie-Antoi- 
nette, 126, 1 28; letters of advice to Marie- 
Antoinette, 131, 16S, 170, 178, 180; letters 
from the Comte de Mercy-Argenteau, 152, 
167, 176, 179, 181, 200, 201; letters from 
Marie-Antoinette, 160, 169, 1S5 ; alarmed 
at the fall of the Due de Choiseul, 167 ; 
letters to the Comte de Mercy-Argenteau, 
170, 177, 186 ; striking characteristics of, 
172. 

Marie-Antoinette, bedside reception of, 2, 109; 
birth of, 121; early life of, 121, 122; her 
love for Versailles, 126; to be dauphine of 
France, 126 ; letter to the dauphin of 
France, 127, 12S; takes leave of her fam- 
ily, 130 ; letters of advice from her mother, 
131, 168, 170, 178, iSo; presented to the 
French, 134, 135; triumphal journey of, 
137; welcomed by the Due de Choiseul, 
138 ; received by Louis XV., 138 ; visits 
Madame Louise at St. Denis, 139 ; arrival 
at palace at Versailles, 140; portrait drawn 
by Bachaumont, 141 ; marriage ceremony 
of, 142 ; the object of a delirious admira- 
tion, 150; married life of, 155; snares and 
pitfalls beset her path, 1 59 ; lettei > to Maria 
Theresa, 160, 169, 185; indignant at fall of 
the Due de Choiseul, 167 ; civil bearing 
towards Madame du Barry, 169 ; a victim 
of politics, 171 ; the little scholar of Schon- 
brunn and the Burg, 173 ; still a mere child, 
174; surrounded by enemies, 176; partic- 



ularly bitter against " Mesdames," 177 ; still 
the idol of court and nation, 182; con- 
trasted with the Comtesse de Provence and 
the Comtesse d'Artois, 182 ; everywhere 
stands first, 182 ; attends ball in apartments 
of the Comtesse de Noailles, 1S4 ; visits the 
cathedral of Notre Dame, the church of 
St. Genevieve, and the palace of the Tuile- 
ries, 185; seemed truly happy, 1S6; letter 
from Madame du Barry, 213 ; execution of, 
219. 

Marivaux, plays of, 41 ; " La Reunion des 
Amours," 48. 

Marmontel, court paid to, 15. 

Marigny, Marquis de, title given to Abel 
Poisson, 19S. 

Marsan, Princesse de, 41. 

Martin, M. Henri, phenomenon in the court, 
165. 

Massillon, wretched condition of the people, 

35- 

Maupeou, Chancellor, pamphlets against, 10; 
urges Madame du Barry to oppose the Due 
de Choiseul, 109, 189, 190. 

Maximilian, Archduke, proxy for the dauphin 
of France at his marriage to Marie-Antoi- 
nette, 127. 

Mazariii, 91. 

Mercy-Argenteau, Comte de, ambassador at 
the Court of Versailles, 151 ; letters to 
Maria Theresa, 152, 167, 176, 179, 181, 200, 
201 ; letters from Maria Theresa, 170, 177, 
186; a model for diplomatists, 173; char- 
acteristics of, 173. 

Merimee, Prosper, 56. 

Mesdames de France (the king's daughters). 
Mademoiselle Genet installed as reader to, 
81 ; Marie-Antoinette particularly bitter 
against, 177 ; devotion to Louis XV., 203. 

Mesmes, Madame de, correspondence with 
Gustavus III., king of Sweden, 42. 

Metastasio, Italian poet, 121. 

Mirabeau, Marquis de, writes in regard to 
the clergy, 18. 

Mirepoix, Marechale de, considers Madame 
Louise a madwoman, 116 ; intimate associ- 
ate of Madame du Barry, iSS. 

Mondou, Abbe, the confessor of Louis XV., 
204. 

Montagu, George, letter from Horacg Wal- 
pole, describing Madame du Barry, 106. 



234 



Index. 



Mortemart, Madame de, daughter of the Due 
de Cosse-Biissac, 94. 

Montesquieu, three estates in France, 24. 

Montrable, Marquise de, title given by Ma- 
dame du Barry to her mother, 191 ; provis- 
ions made by Madame du Barry for, 192. 

Moreau le Jeune, beautiful aquarelle of, 193. 

Mortemart, Madame de, daughter of the Due 
de Cosse-Brissac, 214. 

Mouy, M. Charles de, 61. 

Mozart, the child Marie- Antoinette plays with, 
122. 

Musee du Louvre, 193. 

Narbonne, Comtesse de, 153. 

Nivernais, Due de, 41. 

Noailles, Comte de, type of the new France, 
1S4. 

Noailles, Comtesse de, 41 ; maid of honor to 
Marie-Antoinette, 133; Marie-Antoinette 
begs her to be her guide, 135 ; balls given in 
apartments of, 1S4. 

Nobility, two parties in, 14. 

Nobles, tremendous gulf between bourgeoisie 
and, 15. 

Notre Dame, Marie-Antoinette visits cathe- 
dral of, 185. 

" Nouvelle Heloi'se," gives new turn to the 
erotic morals of France, 51. 

Noverre, Marie-Antoinette dances with, 124. 

Noyon, Bishop of, assemblage of the leading 
nobles at house of, 144. 

QElL-DE-BcEUF, courtiers about doors of the, 

118. 
Ogny, M. d', director of secret post-otHce, 86. 
Orleans, Due d', Villers-Cotterets and Chan- 

tilly the seats of, 10. 

Palfy, Count, unceremonious calls of Maria 
Theresa upon, 122. 

" Pandore," of M. de Labord, 191. 

Parc-aux-Cerfs, partially suppressed, 83 ; 
orgies of, 87 ; a harem whose inmates were 
constantly changing, 93 ; secret visits of 
Louis XV. to, 103. 

Paris, the fountain-head of public opinion, 2 ; 
famous salons of, 53. 

Parliamentarians, occupy position midway be- 
tween greatest nobles and the bottrgeoisie, 
23; held in holy horror by Louis XV., 23. 



" Parliament Maupeou," 26 ; discredited from 
start, 26 ; an entirely passive body, 189. 

Parliament of Paris, 25. 

Parliament, victory of Louis XV., over, 12; 
has become almost Republican, 91. 

Parma, Duchess of 88. 

" Pavilion de Tfichange," 133 ; Marie-Antoi- 
nette presented to the French at the, 134. 

Penthievre, Due de, the chAteim of Luciennes 
purchased from, 104 ; devotion of the Prin- 
cesse de Lamballe to, 183 ; Florian dedi- 
cates poem to, 1S3. 

Perreyve, Abbe, 125. 

" Persee," performance in the new theatre at 
Versailles of the opera, 143. 

Petit-Trianon, Louis XV. stricken at, 202. 

Philosophes, distrust of their doctrines, 2 ; foes 
of, 14 ; female, 41 ; heroes of the hour, 72 ; 
Walpole's opinion of, 73 ; Walpole cannot 
accustom himself to, 76. 

Place Louis XV., celebration of the dauphin's 
nuptials at the, 147 ; catastrophe at the, 
148 ; place of execution, 222. 

" Plaideurs," of Racine, 28. 

Poisson, Abel, transformation into the "Mar- 
quis de Marigny," 198. 

Poland, first partition of, 196. 

Pompadour, Madame de, 23 ; overthrew the 
Jesuits, 26; compared with Madame du 
Barry, 197 ; Madame du Barry placed 
above, 198 ; last word of, 224. 

Poniatowski, Stanislas, king of Poland, 60; 
friend of Madame Geoffrin, 60 ; visit from 
Madame Geoffrin, 123. 

Pont-Neut, Louis XV. crosses the, 33. 

Provence, Comte de, 155 ; a skilful politician, 
176. 

Provence, Comtesse de, contrast between 
Marie-Antoinette and, 182. 

Proyart, Abbe, 119, 158. 

" Pucelle," of Voltaire, 22. 

QuiNAULT, writes words for the opera " Per- 
see," 143. 

Quincerot, M. d'Haranguier de, equerry of 
Madame Louise, 114. 

Racine, " Plaideurs " of, 28 ; heroines of, 51. 
Rangon, Mademoiselle, assumed name of 

Madame du Barry, 96. 
Raynal, court paid to, 15. 



Index. 



235 



Regnaud, Memoirs of, 31. 

Richelieu, Marechal de, 20 ; frivolous, 43 ; 
approves of Madame du Barry, 105. 

Roche-Aymon, Cardinal de la, at death-bed 
of Louis XV., 205. 

Rohan, Prince Louis de, remarks to Marie- 
Antoinette, 136. 

Romance, quite out of date, 47. 

Rome, patrician ladies of ancient, 42. 

Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, century of, 6 ; pupils 

■ of, 42; passion of, 52; first place in public 
esteem belongs to, 53 ; the son of a clock- 
maker, 53 ; fascinated by Madame la Mare- 
chale de Luxembourg, 55. 

St. Anne, convent of, 96. 
St. Denis, Carmelite monastery at, 113; Mad- 
ame Louise enters, 114; to be seen from 

the pavilion of Luciennes, ig6; Louis XV. 

buried at, 207. 
St. Elisabeth, Convent of, mother of Madame 

du Barry comfortably located at, 192. 
Sainte-Beuve, calls Le Roy " a La Bruyere 

on liorseback," 88. 
Sainte-Pelagie, Madame du Barry sent to the 

prison of, 218. 
St. Genevieve, Marie-Antoinette visits church 

of, 185. 
Saint-Germain, Comte de, supposed to possess 

elixir of life, 85. 
St. Germain, to be seen from the pavilion of 

Luciennes, 196. 
St. Laurent, church of, 98. 
Saint Louis, cross of, 16. 
Saint-Priest, M. de, member of secret body, 

86. 
St. Roch, Church of, 66. 
Sainville, Marie-Antoinette studies elocution 

with, 124. 
Salic law, women take sweet revenge for, 41. 
Salle des Gardes, 203. 
Salons, famous ones of Paris, 53 ; arouse the 

admiration of all Europe, 66. 
Sanson, the executioner of Marie-Antoinette, 

219. 
Sardou, M., 215. 
Sartine, M. de, 28. 
Saulx-Tavannes, Comte de, knight of honor 

to Marie-Antoinette, 134. 
Schonbrunn, Marie - Antoinette the little 

scholar of, 173. 



Schutteren, arrival of Marie-Antoinette at, 

,133- 

Segur, Comte de, 14; tremendous gulf be- 
tween nobles and bourgeoisie, 1 5 ; sympathy 
for Louis XV., Sg ; old social structure 
undermined, 90; type of the new France, 
184. 

Senez, Bishop of, see Beauvais, Abbe de. 

Senlis, Bishop of, 142. 

Seven Years' War, repetition likely, 165. 

Sevigne, Madame de, 62 ; the personification 
of the seventeenth century, 64. 

Societedu Moment, 49. 

Society, divided into two classes, 19; picture 
of, at the close of reign of Louis XV., 44 ; 
perverse, frivolous, and guilty, 49 ; rotten to 
the core, 78. 

Sophie, Madame, daughter of Louis XV., 83 ; 
letter to Madame Louise, 115. 

Strasbourg, University of, Goethe a student 
at, 134. 

Taine, M., "Les Origines de la France con- 

temporaine," 16. 
Talmont, Madame de, 41. 
Tarouka, Due de, lays wager with Empress 

Maria Theresa, 121. 
Terney, Abbe du, confessor of Madame 

Louise, 113. 
Terray, Abbe, urges Madame du Barry to 

oppose the Due de Choiseul, 109. 
Tesse, Comte de, first equerry to Marie- 
Antoinette, 134. 
Therese-Augustine, Sister, name assumed by 

Madame Louise after entering monastery 

of St. Denis, 157. 
Thiers, Baron de, 18S. 
Tournon, Marquis de, daughter married to 

Vicomte Adolphe du Barry, 198. 
Troyes, Bishop of, 158. 
Tuileries, Marie-Antoinette visits palace of 

the, 185. 
Turgot, faithful friend of Mademoiselle de 

Lespinasse, 65. 

Van Dyke, 188. 
Van Swieten, 186. 
Vaubernier, Jean-Jacques Gomard de, father 

of Madame du Barry, 94. 
Vergennes, M. de, member of secret body 

86. 



236 



Index. 



Vermond, Abbe de, preceptor of Marie- 
Antoinette, 126. 

Vernet, Joseph, decorates pavilion of Lu- 
ciennes, 193. 

Versailles, still retains prestige, 2 ; no longer 
trembled before Louis XV., 8 ; affairs still 
decorously conducted at, 8 ; an essentially 
royal city, 9; ladies from, 16; marble stair- 
way at, iS ; Louis XV. ruled by women at, 
41 ; cabinet of, 87 ; love of Marie-Antoi- 
nette for, 126; arrival of Marie-Antoinette 
at palace at, 140 ; new theatre opened at, 
143 ; a desert, 2H. 

Vice, revolting in one whose hair is gray, 82. 

Victoire, Madame, cabinet of, 82 ; daughter 
of Louis XV., 83. 

Vien, paintings by, 193. 

Villers-Cotterets crowded, 10; seat of Due 
d'Orleans and Prince de Conde, 10. 

Vintimille, Comtesse de, last word of, 224. 

Virgil, 222. 

Voltaire, condemnation of, 3 ; century of, 6 ; 
disciples of, 22; "Pucelle" of, 22; first 
place in public esteem belongs to, 53 ; the 
son of a notary, 53 ; fears the Marquise du 
Deffand, 64 ; letter from the Marquise du 
Deffand, 68 ; calls Catholic religion infam- 
ous, 74 ; letter of Bachaumont's about, 74 ; 
builds Catholic church, 75 ; Jews better 
Christians than, 76; Due de Choiseul a fol- 
lower of, 91 ; fawns upon Madame du 
Barry, igo; letter to Madame du Barry, 190. 

Von der Burg, the palace, 127. 



Walpole, Horace, saying of, 7 ; writes on 
distress at court, 10 ; thinks literature fills 
too great a place in social intercourse, 53 ; 
picture of Duchesse de Choiseul, 58; letter 
to Lady Hervey about Madame Geoffrin, 
61 ; the Marquise du Deffand falls in love 
with, 69 ; atheists proclaiming against Icings 
as against priests, 71 ; opinion of the 
philosophes, 73; opinion of atheism, 75, 
cannot accustom himself to t\\& philosophes, 

76 ; laughing gone out of fashion, 76; seeks 
asylum at the Chartreuse, 77; prefers Le- 
sueur to all painters of his acquaintance, 

77 ; grows melancholy over spirit of the 
time, 78 ; letters from the Marquise du 
Deffand, 105, 107, 143: letter to George 
Montagu describing Madame du Barry, 
106. 

Weber, leave-taking between Marie-Antoi- 
nette and her family, 130. 

Women, coming to play a more important 
part, 41 ; rule Louis XV. and his ministers 
at Versailles, 41 ; acknowledged arbiters of 
fashion, literature, and art, at Paris, 41 ; 
take sweet revenge for Salic law, 41 ; have 
upper hand among Frenchmen, 41 ; friends 
of the Jesuits, 41 ; enemies of the " En- 
cyclopedie," 41 ; politicians, 42. 

Zamore, the living toy, 194 ; appointed gov- 
ernor of the pavilion of Luciennes, 194; 
sends Madame du Barry to the scaffold, 
216. 



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